


Idiosyncrasy

by Rival_Distiller



Series: Unmasked [1]
Category: Five Nights at Freddy's
Genre: Attempted Kidnapping, Attempted Murder, Ballora is Legally Blind, Blends Elements of the Games and Novels and Junk I Came Up With, Blood, Bon-Bon is a Puppet But He Might Still Be Alive(?), Childhood Trauma, Childishness, Explicit Language, Gen, How Do I Tag, Major Family Issues, Mostly a Human Au But Some Characters Are Still Animatronics, Murder, Near Death Experiences, The SL Characters Live Where They Work, Violence, takes place in the 90s
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-07
Updated: 2021-02-20
Packaged: 2021-03-07 20:08:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 21
Words: 26,836
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26883403
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rival_Distiller/pseuds/Rival_Distiller
Summary: Funtime Foxy always knew his boss was somewhat...odd. But he never expected to end up chasing a murderer with her.
Series: Unmasked [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1961389
Comments: 6
Kudos: 21





	1. Something Nothing

Foxy woke up to the sharp rapping of knuckles against his bedroom door. Short, rhythmic knocks. They weren't very loud, but they still woke him up. He was a light sleeper.

He opened his eyes slowly, groaning slightly into the blanket that was draped haphazardly over his body. "What?" he mumbled, dragging the word with his tiredness.

The voice that responded from the other side of the door was laced with a heavy accent. French. "Just thought I would let you know that everyone else is already up. They're all downstairs. I don't think your alarm went off."

Foxy pushed himself up into a sitting position, attempting to get his long hair out of his face so that he could see the numbers displayed on his alarm clock. It seemed that she was right. "Oh, yeah. Thanks, Bal. I'll be down in a minute."

He waited until the dancer's light footsteps completely faded before actually bothering to get out of bed.

He put his hair into a sloppy ponytail, put on socks because the floor was frigid, and tried to halfheartedly rub the lipstick off of his face from yesterday before deciding that was good enough for the current moment.

He exited his room and trudged downstairs to the kitchen, where, as Ballora said, everyone was. They were all seated around the crappy fold-out table in the center of the space.

Ballora herself was sat furthest away from the doorway, gently stabbing her food with a fork as she stared absentmindedly at the wall.

Freddy was sat beside her and was seemingly the only one wide awake. He was busy shoveling some sort of sugary cereal into his mouth at record speed.

Bon-Bon was resting on the table next to him, milk and bits of cereal on his muzzle. Freddy had probably shoved the puppet's face into his bowl a few times.

And then there was Baby, sitting at the end of the table with her stupidly rigid posture. She never actually ate breakfast with them for whatever reason. She just drank coffee, which never seemed to actually succeed in waking her up since she always looked tired.

Her eyes were trained on the janky, old TV they had placed on the kitchen counter, which was playing the news. Foxy couldn't tell if she was actually watching it or not, though.

"Hey, guys." He went to grab the bread so he could make toast. He couldn't be bothered to make anything more complicated than toast.

"H-heya!"

"Hello again."

"Hey, Fox."

"Dear Scott, please help me."

Freddy dunked Bon-Bon back into his cereal. Poor soul.

**"In other news today, a woman was found dead behind a diner on Lilygear and—"**

"Geez, there's been a lot of murders on the news lately, huh?"

"There's _always_ a lot of murders on the news," Baby muttered darkly. 

Ballora looked over at her for a moment before her gaze returned to the wall. "Yes, but there hasn't been this many in a while..."

"Can we put on c-cartoons instead?"

"Sure, Fred." Baby got up fiddled with the dial on the TV until she landed on a channel that was playing something animated.

"Yay!"

Foxy slapped his toast onto a plate and took a seat.

They sat in silence for a total of five minutes before Baby spoke again, almost abruptly. "We're supposed to get a shipment after we close today. Fred, Fox, could you please carry everything down to the basement storage room when it gets here?"

"Yeah! I love c-carrying stuff!"

"You're really weird, Fredward."

"Stop b-bullying me, Bon-Bon!"

Foxy choked on his toast a little, coughing rather loudly. "Wait, you want us to take it into the _basement_ storage room?"

"Yeah, that's literally what I just said," Baby replied rather flatly. "Is there a problem?"

He ignored her question. "Could you or Lor possibly do it instead of me?"

"No, Lor and I have to deal with the parents of that kid who broke his wrist here last week after blatantly ignoring me when I told him to get off the table. If you're still worried about rats, nobody's seen one down there since pest control came here. You'll be fine."

Foxy wasn't as bothered by the possibility of rats as he was of the basement storage room itself. He wasn't sure why, but he always had the irrational fear that somebody would be hiding in it whenever he had to enter. Or some sort of supernatural entity. But the rats did bother him too when they were there.

But he was going to have Freddy with him. And he probably shouldn't refuse to do something that his boss was telling him to, even if she was pretty laid back. 

"Okay," he finally said. "You're right. Do you want us to put them in a specific place down there, or wherever's there's space?"

"If you could, put them on that shelf where Fred keeps his Pog collection."

Easy. Easy job. Simple. Put a few boxes on a shelf and leave. Foxy needed to stop being irrational. 

The task was no big deal.


	2. The Dank, Dusty, Dark Storage Room

"Freddy, slow down!" Foxy shouted as Freddy ran past him on the stairs and knocked into his elbow, which nearly made him drop all of the boxes he was carrying.

"S-sorry!" he shouted back, not slowing down in the slightest.

Foxy sighed and continued taking his sweet time, being in no hurry to reach the storage room in their dark, creepy basement.

Freddy had sped past him again by the time he finally reached the bottom of the stairs. "Alright, that's all of my b-boxes! Meet you upstairs!"

"Okay…”

Freddy had closed the door to the storage room when he left, so Foxy had to awkwardly open it with his elbow.

He tried to turn on the lights with his elbow too but was unsuccessful.

He sighed in defeat and tried to navigate through the darkness so that he could put his boxes away.

Slowly, Foxy began to think that his worries were all for nothing. As per usual.

The room was dead quiet. And contrary to what he had thought, nothing had popped out to try to kill him.

He shook his head in an attempt to rid himself of all of his ridiculous thoughts, being careful not to trip over anything.

The boxes went on a shelf near the back. It was pushed up against one of the far corners. 

The only space left was on the highest part of the shelf. Even with the heels on his boots, it was a little difficult for Foxy to reach, but he managed. Just barely.

He dusted his hands off and was about to turn around and head back.

But then he heard something. And he froze.

Something had fallen to the floor.

Something behind him. 

Before Foxy could manage to find a way to brush it off as nothing, it was followed by another sound.

A laugh, A raspy, low laugh. The kind that came from the back of the throat.

Somebody was in the room with him.

A sense of ice-cold dread washed over his entire body.

This was _exactly_ what Foxy had been afraid of since the first time he had gone down to the basement.

Despite all the times he had thought about this happening, he had never actually thought about what he would _do_ if it did.

What was he supposed to _do_?

He debated whether or not turning around and looking was a good idea.

Maybe that was stupid.

Maybe he hadn't actually heard a laugh. 

Maybe he had just imagined it.

But he wasn't willing to take the risk of it just being his imagination. 

Mustering up what little courage remained, Foxy very, very slowly turned around.

The first thing he was greeted with was a pair of eyes. Cold, dead eyes attached to a large, black, mass. 

The shadow launched itself at him the very moment their eyes locked.

Foxy shrieked as he was knocked to the floor, screwing his eyes shut and preparing for death.

But to his surprise, he didn't die.

Nothing tried to stab him, or strangle him, or...anything else.

He could no longer feel the weight of whoever or whatever had tackled him. 

After continuing to lay there for a few seconds, he hesitantly sat up and opened his eyes again, looking around.

It appeared that he was alone again. But who knew? Foxy thought he was alone when he walked in and ended up being wrong about that.

His heart was still pounding in his ears.

Quickly scrambling to his feet, he ran out of the storage room as fast as he could.

He looked over his shoulder to make sure he wasn't being followed.

As he did so, he managed to slam right into somebody.

He lost his balance and fell backward.

Right before he hit the hard tile floor, a pair of hands grabbed his sides.

"Whoa, you alright, Fox?"

He had slammed into his boss.

Baby, unlike Foxy, didn't stumble or lose balance in the slightest when they made contact, nor did the expression on her face change from the one of disinterest that she was currently wearing.

She pulled him back into an upright standing position.

"What are you… What are you doing here?" Foxy asked, struggling to catch his breath.

"Lor and I finished early, so I came to see if you and Fred needed help with the boxes."

Foxy very suddenly grabbed the redhead's broad shoulders, practically yelling into her face as if he had only just remembered why he was running a minute ago.

Again, she didn't flinch or react in the slightest.

"I don't need your help with that, I need your help with something else! Right now!"

She gently pried his hands off. "What's the problem?"

Foxy started to point towards the storage room, trying to form the words necessary to explain the situation and failing. "Down the stairs — I took the boxes and the eyes! The eyes! And laugh, — raspy laugh —!"

"Okay, hold on. Take a deep breath and slow down. I can't understand you."

Foxy took a deep breath and tried again, only slowing down slightly.

"Alright, I was in the basement, taking the boxes to the basement just like you asked. When I was down there, I heard this low, raspy laugh behind me -- it was a man laughing, I think. I turned around and there was this huge shadow in the room —!" He did dramatic hand gestures in an attempt to emphasize just how big the shadow was. "I couldn't make out any features. Just eyes. Cold, dead eyes! They tackled me to the floor but nothing happened after that, and when I opened my eyes and they weren't anywhere in sight! So I ran here before they showed up again."

Baby’s eyebrows furrowed a bit.

She stared at him for a moment before responding.

"So...you think you saw somebody in our storage room?"

Foxy nodded his head rapidly. "Yes! I swear, there is someone — something in there! You have to believe me!"

"Alright, alright. I'll go look." Baby continued down the basement hallway, Foxy following close behind her. 

They stopped in front of the room that was furthest from the stairs. 

The door was still slightly ajar as Foxy hadn't bothered to close it before practically flying towards the stairs.

Baby pushed it open all the way and turned on the lights, which were dim and flickered a bit.

She headed further into the room.

Foxy remained by the doorframe.

"I don't see anyone, Fox."

"There was someone here! I know it!"

"Okay, where exactly did you see something?"

He pointed to the far left corner of the room, where there were a few crates stacked on top of one another. "Over there. In the corner." 

The redhead walked over, finding that the crates weren't actually pushed up against the wall. There was a small space left that was big enough for a person to crouch in.

"Hm..."

"What's over there?" Foxy called from outside the room.

She reached into the space and pulled out a piece of fabric that looked like it had been torn off of someone's clothes. "Fabric. Looks like it was torn off someone's jeans. Black jeans."

"Do you think it's from whoever was in here?"

Baby stared at the fabric for a moment. She looked like she was going to say something, but decided against it. "Might be." She tucked it into the pocket of her jacket.

The two of them spent about five more minutes investigating potential hiding spots that Foxy pointed out. 

"I don't think they're in here anymore."

"Okay… How do you think they got out? How do you think they got in?"

"Uh… Well, they couldn't have gotten in through the front or back door because they're locked. I checked when I got back… They can't have gone upstairs since Fred would have seen them. He's been sitting at the top of the stairs since he finished..."

Baby took a few steps forward.

A crunch was audible.

"What was that?"

She looked down. "Broken glass, apparently." She reached up and pulled aside the small sheet of fabric that covered the basement window, which was broken. "Well, there's your answer."

"Oh no. What if they try to come in through the window again?"

"Uh...I don't know...I suppose I can board it up."

"Alright… do you think you can do that right now?" Foxy's voice cracked a little at the end of his sentence.

"Yeah, of course. You can go back upstairs."

"Okay." He turned to leave. "Alright."

"Actually, wait."

He paused. "Yeah?"

"Tell the others that for the time being, they're not allowed to go down to the basement without me."

Foxy nodded. "I will." 

He left the basement in a hurry, wondering who the hell that was down there.


	3. Paranoid

Foxy was sitting on the couch wrapped in a blanket, his eyes glued to the TV in front of him.

It was late. 

Everybody's shifts had ended hours ago and they had all retreated to different parts of the establishment, leaving Foxy all alone.

**"William Afton was notorious for murdering children at a pizza chain by the name of 'Freddy Fazbear's Pizza'."**

He kind of wished he wasn't alone.

**"At the start of his killings, William Afton had three children. Two sons and one—"** The TV suddenly cut off. 

He blinked, taking a moment before turning his head to look behind the couch and towards the doorway.

His amber eyes met blue ones.

"What did you do that for?"

"I think you need to stop watching these murderer and serial killer documentaries," Baby explained, putting the TV remote down.

"Why?"

"Because if I have to get up in the middle of the night to check under your bed because you watched that one about that guy who hid under that woman's bed and crawled out and killed her once she fell asleep, or go outside because you heard a suspicious noise and watched that one about the family who had their home broken into and all of them ended up dead, or look _anywhere_ else one more time I'm certain that I'm going to lose it."

"Well, I can't ask Freddy because he's too scared, and I can't ask Ballora because its a lot more difficult for her to see when it’s dark!" Foxy replied defensively. "Plus, you're way more intimidating than I am!”

"Look, I get _why_ you're paranoid. I get _why_ you've got murderers and serial killers on your mind, but you're really not helping yourself by watching this junk."

Foxy knew that, but he couldn't help himself. He _needed_ to see it.

"But I'm watching a really interesting one on this guy called William Afton."

Baby gave him an odd, indecipherable look. "Don't… Just take a break. I've heard about the stuff Afton has done. You’ll definitely get nightmares watching that."

Foxy frowned. He knew that too. He knew that it'd probably give him nightmares, but he still wanted to watch it. He didn't really like the possible scenarios and thoughts the documentaries put in his head, but he still wanted to watch them.

He picked the remote up, trying to turn the TV back on, but nothing happened when he pushed the power button. 

He pushed it a few more times, and still, nothing happened.

"Wha—?"

"I took the batteries out of the remote before putting it down." 

Foxy turned the remote over and pulled the battery cover off. The batteries were indeed gone. 

He had no clue how Baby managed to do that in the span of time it took for her to turn off the TV and put the remote down without him noticing.

"C'mon, why don't you do something else?"

"Alright..." Foxy grumbled. 

He followed her out of the small room, shuddering slightly as they passed by the basement door.

"Hey, Baby?" he asked suddenly.

"Hm?"

"Do you think we're ever gonna see whoever was in our basement again?"

It had been a week and a half since the storage room incident.

"I don't know." Not the most reassuring answer, really.

Foxy was about to respond but got cut short by the sound of somebody screaming at the top of their lungs. "That...sounded like Freddy, didn't it?"

"Yeah. It did." Baby suddenly grabbed Foxy's arm and started dragging him towards the source of the noise.

He tripped over his feet a bit, struggling to keep up with her.

She threw open the door to Freddy's small room. "What's wrong!?"

"There's a sp-spider on the floor!" Freddy yelled, clinging to the ceiling fan.

"You're such a wuss, Fredward," Bon-Bon groaned, resting on top of one of the ceiling fan blades.

"Am not!"

Foxy had to admit, the spider on the floor _was_ pretty big, but he wished that Freddy didn't scream like he was being murdered when he saw it. He felt like all the air had left his lungs when the ventriloquist shrieked.

Baby sighed, "You scared the shit out of us. Please don't scream like that unless someone is _actually_ trying to kill you."

"What are y-you talking about? That thing c-could kill me! What if it's poisonous?!"

"I'm pretty sure it's not.” Baby grabbed an empty drink cup off of Freddy’s dresser and pried the plastic top off, using the lid to get the arachnid into it. “Lor, could you please take this spider outside?”

Ballora, who had come from her own room at the sound of the screaming, entered as Foxy stepped aside. "Yes, of course." She took the cup and left.

Ballora was never bothered by spiders. Foxy was convinced that they were her favorite animal or something.

"C'mon, Fred. Lor got rid of it. It's safe to come down now," Baby said.

"No!"

The redhead was definitely tall enough to just reach up and pull him off, but she didn't. Most likely because Freddy would end up gripping onto the fan for dear life, resulting in it getting pulled out of the ceiling. 

"What are you gonna do if the fan comes out of the ceiling and you fall? You have to come down."

"I don't w-wanna. Wh-what if there are more spiders?!"

"I doubt that there is."

"It's so fucking dusty up here," Bon-Bon complained. "I swear to Scott if you don't get us down—"

"If you come down, I'll, uh… I'll get you gummy bears?"

Freddy's face lit up. "R-really?"

"Yeah, but you gotta come down first."

"Okay!" Freddy grabbed onto Bon-Bon, who muttered obscenities under his breath as he was tucked under the ventriloquist's arm. 

He then proceeded to let himself fall from the fan, leaving Baby to catch him.

And she did, albeit somewhat awkwardly.

She repositioned her grip on him so that she was carrying him fireman style and turned towards Foxy, who completely forgot he was standing in the doorway. "Wanna come with me to the Faz-Mart to get this goofball some gummy bears?"

"Sure."

He followed after her as she carried Freddy away.


	4. Hidden Behind the Dumpster

It seemed to Foxy that they always had supplies coming in. It was as if they burned through them the moment they came in. 

They hadn't been using the basement storage room very much since… y'know, they found some creepy guy hiding in there. But they had another storage room outside of the basement. It was a lot smaller, but it worked.

At the current moment, Foxy was in the middle of taking some boxes to that storage room and struggling with it.

"Crap, crap, crap!" he repeated as his stack started to lean more to the side with every step, despite his attempts to get them to lean back the other direction.

After about six more steps he nearly lost his balance and the boxes started to tip.

"Crap!"

Luckily for him, someone came over and pushed the stack back into place right before they fell.

"Whoa, careful now."

Foxy breathed a sigh of relief. "Thanks."

"Yeah, no problem. Let me help you with these." Baby took a few of the boxes, enough so that Foxy could actually see in front of himself again. "I said that this new shipment is going straight to the storage room, right?"

Foxy nodded. "Yep. And this is the last of it. Do you know if there's anything else that needs to be done?"

"Uh… I think the trash in the kitchen still needs to be taken out."

"Alright, I'll take care of that," Foxy said. "By the way, why do you still have your mask on?" 

All of them wore masks during work hours. Foxy and Freddy would wear animal masks, and Ballora and Baby would wear human-like ones. In all honesty, if they didn't have to wear them, Foxy probably wouldn't. The eyeholes of their masks appeared pitch black under the harsh lighting of the showroom and he didn't like it. It was creepy.

"Huh? Oh, I didn't even realize I still had it on." Baby pulled the mask off once she set her boxes down. "You know what? I'll put these away so that you can take out the trash and finish sooner."

If Foxy didn't have to set foot in one of the storage rooms he was quite okay with that. He sent the redhead an appreciative smile before heading to get the trash.

He made his way to the back door after grabbing it, having to pause for a moment to retie the bag.

The dumpster was in the parking lot behind the building, pushed up near the small forest that lined it. 

The lid was already open so Foxy decided to try and hurl the bag in. 

It ended up landing on the rim. 

He sighed, reaching up to shove it all the way in. As he did, his eyes traveled to something poking out from behind the dumpster.

"What...?" he mumbled to himself, stepping to the side a bit to get a better view.

It was a pair of human feet.

Was there somebody sleeping back there?

Foxy cautiously got closer, trying to see more than just the person's dirty shoes.

"Oh no...no, no, no..."

The person was a woman that appeared to be in her early twenties with brown hair and brown eyes. 

Foxy could see her eyes because she wasn't asleep, she was...

She was _dead_.

A large, gaping hole was smack dab in the middle of her chest, bits of her broken ribs sticking out around the edges.

There was a huge gash across her neck.

Red stains were all around her mouth, which was slightly agape, and led down into the puddle of blood that had formed around her neck.

Her eyes were glazed and empty, staring blankly into the forest. 

Foxy felt rooted to the spot.

And like he _might_ throw up.

He wanted to look away but he couldn't.

He kept his eyes trained on the body once he finally managed to get himself moving again.

"Guys..." he said loudly.

He broke into a sprint as soon as he passed the doorframe. 

"Guys!"

Everyone gathered in the back room fairly quickly.

Before anyone could ask what was wrong, Foxy shouted, "We have a problem! There's a _dead body_ behind the dumpster outside!"

"I'm sorry, what?" Ballora asked.

"There. Is. A. Body. Outside!" Foxy grabbed everybody and dragged them outside. "Look! You can see the feet poking out!" 

He didn't pull them any closer since he didn't want to make them look at the gore.

Though of course, not all of them stayed away.

Baby walked right up to the body and kneeled beside it, examining it. 

Freddy hesitantly stepped a bit closer and so did Foxy.

Foxy noted something...odd. Something odd and unfamiliar behind her eyes.

"Hm...the body doesn't even look that old."

"How do you… How do you think she died?" Foxy asked, not even sure if he was expecting an actual answer. 

Or if he wanted one.

"I don't know..." Baby replied in an oddly calm tone. 

Well, her voice was usually oddly calm, but there was something different about it this time. 

She continued to stare at the body for a minute. 

Then, without warning, she plunged her hand straight into the gaping hole in the woman's chest.

Everyone but Ballora, who couldn’t see from where she stood, recoiled but shock and disgust.

"Baby, what the hell?! Get your hand out of her! You can't just stick your hand in people's chest holes like that!" Foxy sputtered out.

"Hold on." She dug around a little more before she pulled her hand out, which was now stained red.

"Why did y-you do th-that?" 

Baby blinked as if she had forgotten where she was and was unsure of what was going on. "Apologies, I don't know what came over me." She cleared her throat. "But look at this."

She walked back over to her friends and they quickly backed up.

"H-hey, don't c-come near us with that!"

"No, look." She brought her hand closer to them.

Foxy inched away a little more so that blood didn't drip onto his shoes.

"...What is it?" Ballora asked.

"Wires and a fake eye?" Freddy and Foxy said in unison.

"Yeah, last time I checked you don't usually find that inside of people's chests." The redhead brought her thumb across the top of the eye, rubbing a bit of blood off of the gray iris. "And look at the ground. There's some weird substance -- definitely not a bodily substance -- forming a trail over to the forest. It's in the palm of her hand too."

"I still can't believe you just reached in and pulled it out."

"Yeah, me neither," she replied offhandedly.

Sometimes Foxy didn't understand Baby.

"I'm going to call Burke," she announced abruptly. She walked back inside, placed the wires and eyeball on their clean tabletop, and wiped her hand on her suit coat before grabbing the phone.


	5. Something Stirring

Chief Burke showed up a good ten minutes after he was called. 

He stepped out of his car with a grim look on his face and started to examine the body as he spoke to Baby, who had decided to remain outside by herself despite protests from the others. 

Foxy watched them from the break room, which is where he had been sitting since Baby put down the phone.

He couldn't hear a word of the conversation and he wasn't sure if he wanted to get closer. 

A part of him was curious about what Chief Burke was saying as he paced around the body, looking at it from possible every angle. The other part didn't want to get caught awkwardly spying on the conversation, even though they probably wouldn't have stopped him from joining in. Especially since he was the one that actually found the body.

After a few minutes of internal debate, Foxy eventually decided that he _did_ want to get closer. 

He walked up to the door and pressed himself against the wall beside it, putting himself out of view and just within earshot.

"Please tell me that you at least wore gloves."

"I did not."

Chief Burke sighed, "You have to, Riley. I told you that the last time. You’re contaminating the crime scene if you don’t."

"Sorry."

_Last time_? The hell did that mean?

"What did you say you found in her?"

"Wires and a fake eyeball. It was right next to that lung." Baby pointed to it before handing the bloodied items to him. "At least, I _think_ that was a lung."

Chief Burke hummed in thought. "You see this blue liquid that's spattered all over the ground and in the palm of her hand?"

"Yeah. Makes a trail straight into the forest."

"We found a body with a similar liquid all over her clothes the other day. She looked a bit like this woman."

"Did you find out what that liquid was?"

"Hydraulic fluid. It's strange, though. It wasn't something you would typically find where we found it. The same could be said here." He kneeled down. "It seems that they were also killed in a similar fashion... Most of the bodies we've been finding lately have the gaping hole in the chest, but the others are far...messier looking."

"So it seems like it's all being done by one person. Do you have any idea who the killer might be?"

"I think your guess might be the same as mine, actually." Chief Burke stood back up and looked at the redhead expectantly, waiting for her to fill in the blank. 

She didn't, she just stared at the ground with her expression hardening. 

Eventually, he filled it in for her. "William Afton."

Afton? Foxy was under the impression that he was dead. Or at least, that's what they said in the documentary Baby told him not to watch. But maybe he wasn't actually dead...?

The possibility sent shivers down his spine. The man had done really terrible things from what he had heard. And now there was a possibility that he was in the area. More specifically, in the parking lot behind the place that he lived in.

"Why would that be your guess?" Baby's tone became very uneven. It was a weird thing to hear. Foxy had never heard her voice be anything but monotone before. 

"Well, most of the people William Afton murdered were found cut open," he gestured to the woman, "like that. Afton often wore some weird mascot suit that turned into an animatronic when he killed. While I'm not really all that sure how it worked, I do know that hydraulic fluid is sometimes used to make animatronics move. And this eye you just handed me definitely isn't a prosthetic... Prosthetic eyes aren't completely round."

"He never used hydraulic fluid for animatronics... He used compressed air."

Both voices got a lot quieter all of a sudden and Foxy could no longer hear them. He strained his ears, but he still couldn't catch anything comprehensible. It wasn't until a few minutes later that they became more audible again. 

"You and your friends stay safe. I wouldn't recommend staying the night here. Oh, and please get Alex. I need to speak to him too."

Baby nodded before she started to head back towards the door.

Foxy remained pressed up against the wall and scooted away from the doorframe a bit, hoping she wouldn't notice him as she passed by.

And somehow, she didn't. She passed right by Foxy, mumbling to herself as she headed off in search of him.

Foxy waited until she left the room before moving again. 

He looked out the door at Chief Burke, who was talking into his police radio, undoubtedly getting more officers to come over.

He tore his eyes away after a moment and started following after Baby, who was going to send him right back to Burke.


	6. Should be a Dead Girl

Questioning seemed to take forever and by the time Foxy was done he wasn't really sure what to do with himself.

What does one do after happening upon a literal corpse outside of their place of work? Foxy looked back over his shoulder at the dumpster. He could no longer see the woman from where he stood, but it didn’t matter. The image would already forever be burned into his retinas.

Quickly, in an effort to get further away from the crime scene, Foxy decided that he ought to check up on the others. That seemed like a logical thing to do.

Somewhat unsurprisingly, he found Baby first. She was leaning against the wall by the back door, her eyes trained on the darkening sky as she absentmindedly played with her Zippo lighter.

"You alright?" Foxy asked.

"Yes," she responded without looking at him.

Foxy didn't really believe that for some reason. "I'm going back inside." He jabbed his thumb in the direction of the door. "Are you coming?"

"No, I think I'm gonna stay out here for a bit."

He shot her a questioning look. "Are you sure...?" He was unsure of why anybody would want to stay outside by themselves right after a body turned up nearby. Especially since Burke had just gone to the front of the building to speak to the other officers that had arrived. If you were attacked and screamed, you could very well already be dead by the time it'd take for them to get around back.

...Or maybe that was stupid. Foxy couldn't tell.

"I'm sure."

"But what if… y'know, the killer’s still lurking out here?" The trees that lined the back parking lot were dense and the leaves left almost everything shrouded in shadows. Anything could be hiding in them. "What if he’s still out here somewhere?"

"If he's still out here I'll bash his fucking head in until it's nothing but a red stain on the concrete,” Baby replied, finally looking down at him. There was an underlying hint of aggression in her voice. “But I doubt he’s around. You’d have to be pretty dense to hang around when you’ve just committed murder. Unless you’re intending to get caught, of course.”

"Right..." Foxy said slowly, slightly taken aback. "You know, I can't tell if you're being serious or not."

When he got no response, he asked again. "You sure you're alright?"

"I'm fine, Fox. Go back inside. It's getting cold out here."

He sighed in defeat, finally heading inside.

After sparing one last glance at the back door, he decided to look for Freddy and Ballora. It didn't take long to find them either. They were both sitting at the fold-out table in the kitchen, not even speaking to each other.

Both of their heads turned towards him when they heard his footsteps growing close.

"What's going on out there, Foxy?" Ballora asked.

"Chief Burke questioned me and Baby, and now he's talking to more cops out by the front."

"Hey, speaking of the clown, where the hell is she?" Bon-Bon piped up.

"She's still outside."

"Why?"

Foxy just shrugged. "I don’t know. I tried to get her to come inside, but she didn't want to."

Ballora’s disapproval was apparent on her face. "Well, you still shouldn’t let her stay out there if you're not going to sit in the back room. Now is not the time for any of us to be by ourselves. Go back and bring her inside, please."

"Okay." Foxy jogged back down the hallway and over to the door.

He pushed it open and stepped outside.

The tall redhead was nowhere to be seen.

"Riley?" he called.

No response.

Foxy's eyes scanned the empty parking lot and the forest but found nothing.

He called her name a few more times.

Still nothing.

Inhaling sharply, he closed the door and started heading back to the kitchen. He would have actually ventured outside in search but realized that he didn't have his keys and didn't want to get locked out. So instead of doing that, he was going to get the others.

"Uh, guys? She's not out there."

And with that, they all started to search for her.

The search was as short-lived as the others had been.

As soon as Foxy opened the door to the first room outside of the kitchen -- which was the supply closet -- he was greeted with their boss.

She scared him quite badly.

Baby had a screwdriver in her hand and her mask back on her face. For a split second, Foxy didn't realize it was her and thought she was the murderer.

She waited until he was done shrieking to speak. "Sorry, Fox. Didn't mean to scare you."

And then she just walked away like nothing had happened.

Freddy and Ballora showed up at moments later because of all of the noise.

They both looked to Foxy for an explanation but all he could give was a shrug. "She was in the supply closet. I have no idea what's she's up to, but she's acting weird."

And that was how Baby continued to act for hours after. She constantly went in out of rooms, mumbling things under her breath and gathering random items.

Everyone tried to ignore it and just let her do whatever the hell she was doing but it was proving somewhat difficult.

Okay, very difficult. Especially after she casually passed by them with a tire iron.

It was then that they decided it might be a good idea to ask her what was up.

So the next time that Baby passed by -- with a crowbar this time-- they followed after her.

She threw open the door to her office, walked over to her desk, and began to aggressively root through the drawers.

They all watched from the doorway.

"Alright, F-foxy. Go in th-there and ask."

"What? Why me?"

"I d-dunno, you're g-good at talking to her, so y-you oughta do it!"

With that, Foxy was shoved into the office by Freddy.

Baby took no notice of his presence.

"Baby?"

She didn't respond. The redhead didn't immediately respond about fifty percent of the time when people tried to speak to her. Foxy could never tell if it was because she was too absorbed in whatever thoughts were reeling through her head, or if she just legitimately couldn't hear him.

He walked further into her mess of an office and stopped just short of the desk.

"Baby?" he repeated a bit louder.

She finally looked up. "Oh, hey. You need something?"

"I, uh, was just a little curious about what you're up to."

"What do you mean?"

"I don't know, it’s just... me and the others," Freddy and Ballora poked their heads out from behind the doorframe, "noticed you're acting a little strange. You alright?"

"I'm fine," she replied automatically.

"You don't seem fine," Ballora pointed out.

"I'm fine," Baby repeated.

"Are y-you sure?" Freddy asked.

"Yes. I'm pretty sure."

Bon-Bon groaned, "C'mon, clown. Spill. We all know that you're lying. Just tell us already."

Baby finally paused what she was doing for a moment to have some sort of internal debate with herself. "You want to know what's wrong with me?"

"Yeah, that's why we keep asking you," the puppet replied.

She laughed, but it sounded humorless. "You know what? Fine."

She walked around her desk to stand closer to the others.

"Fine, fine, fine, fine. I'll tell you why I'm all worked up if you want to know so badly. I'll tell you. I'll tell you right now. I'm… I’m so worked up because my _father_ is more than likely the person who killed that woman out back."

Everyone stood in silence for a moment as they tried to process that. Out of all of the replies they had expected to receive, that hadn’t been one of them.

"...Wait, I thought that Chief Burke said the killer is likely William Afton."

"Yeah, that's him."

Foxy was dumbfounded. "But… you can't be… Afton only had one daughter, and she died when she was super young. Like, six." He had learned that from the documentary Baby told him not to watch.

"Wrong. I didn't die. But I almost did," she said. "I don't think that documentary you watched was very well made."

"You— no, you're joking. You don't even have the same name as her."

"That would be because my mother changed it when she took me and my brother away after...after he died. Or didn't, apparently. She took us to a different town and changed our names so that people would stop asking us about him. My birth name isn’t Riley Blake. It's Elizabeth Afton."

Baby had seemed so unwilling to say anything just a few minutes ago. She seemed unwilling to share things about herself most of the time, actually. But now that she had cracked she seemed unable to stop herself from saying more. She was stringing her words so close together, speaking so fast that it was almost hard to understand what she was saying.

It made it all sound real, but Foxy was still having a hard time believing her. He racked his brain for more inconsistencies that would make it all untrue. "You don't look anything like her either. She had blonde hair and green eyes."

"I dye my hair. This isn't my real hair color. And these are contacts." Baby reached up and began to attempt to remove one of her contacts.

Once it was out, her eye was green. Her eyes were actually green. She wasn't lying.

Foxy couldn't think of anything else that would poke holes in what she was saying.

"Wh-why didn't y-you tell us?"

'Would _you_ want to tell someone you're the daughter of a child killer?"

“W-well… no, I guess n-not.”

"Exactly." Baby went back to what she was doing.

Foxy, Ballora, and Freddy could have left after that. But there was still a question that hung in the air.

They awkwardly stood there for a minute, looking at one another, having a silent argument about who should ask, poking and prodding one another in an effort to get somebody to step forward.

Ballora lost. "So… you still haven't really answered our first question."

"What was it again?"

Foxy repeated the question for her. "What are you doing?"

"Oh, I'm going after him."

Everyone fell silent once again.

Baby had said it so casually, like she had just told them that she was heading out to the grocery store or something.

"Um..." Ballora cleared her throat, "isn't that something you leave the police to handle?"

“No, screw the cops. Aside from Burke, none of them believe there’s even a slight chance that William might have not actually died. And besides, they don’t know him like I do. And… and… this is _personal_ , okay? Him showing up in our fucking basement? That’s not a coincidence. He didn’t just so happen to _accidentally_ break into the very place that I work at.

“He was sending a message. And out in the parking lot? That was another message. A fucked up message that somebody had to fucking _die_ for. So before anybody else loses their life, I’m going to find him.”

Foxy, Ballora, and Freddy were about to open their mouths to protest, but Baby put a stop to it before it even started. "You're not going to convince me to stay here. I'm going no matter what you guys say, so don’t even bother trying.”

Foxy was suddenly reminded of just how stubborn Baby could be. Once her mind was set, there was no changing it. Even attempting to was practically pointless.

So he tried something else.

He stepped up to her, trying to stand as confidently as he could. "If that's how it's gonna be, then we're going with you."

Baby let out a bark-like laugh. "No, you're not. You all could get hurt and I'm not letting that happen. No way in hell."

Freddy stepped up next to Foxy. "W-we c-can be j-just as stubborn as y-you. We're tagging along!"

"No, you're not."

Ballora stepped forward as well. "Yes, we are."

"No, you guys don't know what you're getting yourselves into."

"Maybe not, but we definitely aren't about to let you attempt to hunt down a murderer by yourself. Besides… strength in numbers, right?”

Baby sighed.

They weren't going to go with her. That was final.


	7. The Start of the Hunt

“Okay, you know what? _Fine!_ ” Baby finally said. Everybody had been arguing with her for over twenty minutes now and with every second that passed, she was starting to get antsier. “ _Fine_ , you all can come along!”

She gave a whole speech about how she warned them and they could still back out at any time if they wanted to, but nobody wanted to. Even if the prospect was _slightly_ terrifying.

William showing up at their workplace was terrifying as is, and now they were going to willingly seek him out to get up close and personal.

Maybe Foxy felt a little braver because they would be expecting to run into him. Or maybe it was because he was sure that Baby knew how the man ticked. Or _maybe_ , it was because after it was all over, he knew he wouldn't have to worry about him anymore.

Or maybe it was a strange combination of all of that. Whatever the cause, he hoped the feeling would last.

"We're leaving as soon as we figure out where's he's going."

"Alright, so what happens to this place while we're gone?"

"Well, we close, obviously. How’re we supposed to stay open with no employees in the building?”

Foxy felt a bit stupid. “Oh, yeah, I guess we can’t.”

“But I don't plan on leaving things completely unattended. Earlier, when I was still planning on making you guys stay here, I called my older brother to ask him if he could watch over the place and make sure that you all stayed safe. I'm sure he'll be happier to be watching over an empty building rather than an occupied one, though."

Almost as if on cue, there was the sound of somebody knocking on the glass door located at the front of the building.

Foxy's eyes immediately snapped in the direction of the noise.

There was a man standing outside, the setting sun backlighting his body and making his features practically impossible to make out.

"That'll be him." Baby stood up from where she was sitting at one of the tables that customers usually occupied, making her way over to the door to unlock it.

Foxy jumped up and followed after her.

Once they got closer he actually managed to get a good look at the guy.

He didn't really look like his sister. They were both tall and broad-shouldered, but his skin was rather tan and his face was made up by sharp features only slightly softened by his blue eyes. His hair was an unkempt curly brown mess.

"Michael," Baby greeted after unlocking the padlock on the door. "Nice to see you again."

He walked into the building, returning the greeting. "You too. It’s been a while."

There was some sort of strange energy between them. Like they weren’t siblings, but instead, acquaintances who hadn’t seen each other in years.

Michael turned his attention towards Foxy, sticking his hand out. "You're one of the workers here, huh? Name's Michael."

Foxy shook it. "Alex."

"Where's the rest of your friends?"

"They're gathering some supplies. Actually, there's been a change in plans. They're,” Baby shot Foxy a look, as though she still couldn’t believe that she had said yes to him and the others, “coming with me. Do you think you could watch over the building while it's empty?"

Michael nodded. "I can. When are you guys supposed to be leaving?"

"Whenever we figure out where William is heading next."

Michael walked over to the table where they had been sitting moments before. Papers were spread all over the table. Newspaper clippings, notes, and a map of the town they lived in right smack dab in the middle. "I see. Any luck with that so far?"

"Sorta." Foxy sat back down. "We've been marking the places that he’s supposedly been spotted, or been pinned responsible for another murder. Almost all of them are restaurants of some kind." 

He brought his finger across the map to the first X they had made. "This is the location of the earliest police report made about him. It's a fast food place." 

He then dragged his finger to the other Xs in the order they had drawn them. "The next is a diner, then a pizzeria, then one of those kid's places with animatronics, then another fast food place, then another diner, then here..."

"Looks like there's a bit of a path forming. You have a pen?"

Baby grabbed a pen off of the table and handed it to her brother.

"Thanks." After uncapping the pen, Michael bent over the map and started drawing a line that connected the marks. "He's really only hitting places that sell food, and simply going in order of what's in front of what's he's just hit." 

He brought the pen sharply to the right, moving away from the last X on the map. 

"The place closest to your guys' is all the way over here." He drew a circle around a building unfamiliar to them, quite far away from where they stood.

"Alright, it's a place on Breed-Wrisley Avenue. Any idea what it could be?" Baby asked.

Ballora passed through the room, a couple of flashlights in hand. "I know there's a pizza place over there," she announced. "Kind of like this one. I tried to get a job there before coming here."

Foxy, Baby, and Michael exchanged glances.

"That's gotta be it."

By the time they had gathered all of what they needed, the sun had set completely and the night had taken over.

But they weren't waiting until morning to leave.

"I wrote some shorter directions for you guys, but here's the map just in case."

Baby slammed the trunk of the car shut, accepting the map and directions, "Thanks, Michael."

"Stay safe. Seriously."

"We’ll try. Here's the keys."

Michael took the keys and patted his sister on the shoulder a bit awkwardly before heading inside.

It wasn't until after the doors to the building closed again that Baby headed over to the front passenger seat, opened the door, and sat next to Foxy, who was gripping the steering wheel so hard that his knuckles were white.

"You ready, Fox?" she asked as she put the map into the glove compartment.

"...As ready as I'll ever be."

"Good. You three in the back have your seatbelts on?"

"Y-yep!"

"Yeah."

"Yes."

Baby put her own seatbelt on. "Alright then, let's get out of here."

"Okay..." Foxy put the car in reverse, backed out of the parking spot they were in, and shifted into drive so that he could pull out onto the road.

He could only imagine where this would take them all.


	8. The Pizzeria

The first half of the drive was painfully silent and Foxy couldn't stand it.

He wasn't sure if it was painful to any of the others and he didn't really care.

He just wanted it to end. So he decided to end it himself.

"So, um, now that you've like… you know, told us your other name, do you want us to start calling you Elizabeth, or...?"

“No thank you. Riley and Baby work perfectly fine,” Riley answered. “...Elizabeth is practically a different person. One that died a long time ago."

Bon-Bon piped up from the back seat. "Hey, speaking of dead people, could you maybe go into more detail on that thing you said earlier about nearly dying? I'm very curious now."

"Bon-Bon," Ballora scolded, "that's an insensitive way to ask about that."

"It's fine, Lor. I’ve already shared a lot about myself today, what harm would it do to share a little more?”

Baby ran a hand through her hair and took a deep breath before continuing.

"So, uh, I was really young… about six. William’s passion is animatronics. Well, it’s _one_ of his passions. I’m sure you can figure out what the other one is. To me, at the time at least, his creations were amazing. And I was too naive at the time to know their real purpose. There was this one in particular that I really liked. I wanted to see it up close, but he told me to stay away.

"But of course, me being the rebellious and idiotic child I was, I didn't listen to him. While he was distracted I snuck away to see it. I got too close.

"The thing was literally built to kill. It grabbed me and pulled me in. Its insides started closing in on me. Tendril-like wires constricted me. Sharp jagged pieces intended to cut the screaming short dug into my skin. Luckily for me, I guess, he found me before it could finish its job. I ended up with bruises, broken bones, cuts deep enough to need stitches...it wasn't fun. I still have a ton of scars."

Foxy had only ever seen three scars on Baby: one on the back of her hand, one on the side of her neck, and a small one on her bottom lip. But then again, he had only ever seen her bare hands, face, and neck. She never wore short sleeves or anything like that.

"He took me to the hospital and blamed the accident on something else. He made me promise not to tell the rest of the family what I had seen. He tried to convince me that I was remembering the events wrong. But I knew what had really happened. And I knew what he really was. But I was too afraid to tell anyone at the time."

"So... if you don't mind me asking, how did the rest of your family find out if it wasn't from… all of that?" Foxy questioned.

"From the second incident with my brother."

"M-michael?"

"No. It was my younger brother. His name was Miles. He also got badly injured by one of William's creations. Even worse than I was. Still, he was supposed to recover just fine. But then William pulled the plug and killed him. One of the nurses caught him doing it and our mom found out as a result. She was disgusted and horrified.

"He tried to explain himself, he went on about how he was gonna bring him back and make him better. But all I can imagine when I think about it is some sort of fate worse than death. And then, not long after people started digging and the news of the rest of his killings had spread to pretty much the entire town, he died."

She paused for a moment.

"People started to bring William and Miles up constantly. We had news reporters knocking on our door twice a week. Random strangers on the street would stop us. They'd go, 'Hey, aren't you the family of that guy that murdered all those kids? What's it like? Has he ever hurt any of you like he hurt Miles? Do You still love him after finding out what he did?'

"They would turn to my mother and say, 'Your kids look a lot like him, you know.' She eventually had enough. She changed our names and moved us to a different town.

"I moved back because I thought that I could finally handle it. I thought that confronting this town again would help me. I had grown to hate it. I constantly thought about it, and all of the negative memories I had associated with it. I figured that if I moved back after he had gone, after everybody had stopped talking about him, after nobody recognized me anymore, that I would be able to make better memories that overshadowed the bad ones."

"Did you?" Foxy asked.

"Well, I don't want to burn this town to the ground anymore. And I don't find my head constantly flooded with all of the things that I just told you about, so… I guess I did," Riley replied. "Though, admittedly, I'm finding that his return has sent my head back into a place that I'm not all that fond of."

The car remained in painful silence after she had finished.

Eventually, Foxy cleared his throat. "We're here." Glancing at the analog clock in the car, he found that it had just turned eleven.

The lights in the pizzeria appeared to still be on, despite the fact that the faded lettering on the door said that they closed at nine.

"Do you think we should wait until they open?"

"Only if they refuse to acknowledge our existence." Baby threw open the car door.

"Oh, alright." Foxy pulled the keys out of the ignition.

Everyone got out and followed the Baby to the front of the building.

They could see a short woman with blonde hair and blue eyes pass by the windows and door.

Baby knocked to get her attention.

The woman paused, staring at them in confusion for a second before approaching the door. "Sorry, we're closed!" she yelled, her voice a bit hard to understand through the glass.

How could they approach this normally? What could they say that wouldn't weird her out?

"We're not here as customers, we're... here about a safety concern!"

Good enough.

She squinted at them, looking them all up and down. Their attire probably seemed strange since they hadn't changed out of their work uniforms.

Despite that, the woman still said, "Hold on, I'm gonna get my boss!" before jogging away.

She appeared again minutes later with a man wearing a top hat in tow. He approached the door and sent them a friendly but curious smile, asking what he could do for them.

Baby pretty much repeated what she had said earlier.

Shockingly, the man _actually_ unlocked the door and let them in.

"Come on in, it's cold out there. You can tell me more about this concern." He gestured over to an area filled with booths, chairs, and tables. "My name's Teddy, by the way. You guys can grab some chairs if you’d like."

They all obliged, grabbing seats at the table.

Teddy sat across from them, folding his hands on the tabletop. "So, tell me why you're here."

"Are you aware of all the recent murders in this town?" Baby asked.

Excellent way to start. Fantastic. This conversation had only just started and it was already stressing Foxy out.

"I am, it's very sad. Why do you bring it up?"

With that, the entire group launched into a ridiculously long explanation of why they had shown up.

Teddy’s eyes continued to narrow as they went on.

After they finished, he hummed in thought before saying anything. "Well, that is a pretty wild story you have there, friends. I'm not quite inclined to believe you yet, but I want to! You guys seem like a nice, trustworthy bunch. I think I might need a second opinion before I let ya do your thing."

Foxy was honestly expecting this exchange to be far more difficult, but they had either managed to sound incredibly convincing or this guy was just kinda quick to trust people. He hoped whoever his "second opinion" was would be the same way.

"Excuse me while I go grab somebody." With that, Teddy disappeared down the same hallway that the blonde woman -- who was apparently named Chris -- had, leaving them in the room by themselves.

Since nobody was talking, Foxy took the opportunity to look around the place.

It looked somewhat like where he worked, but with an atmosphere that was admittedly cheerier. The walls and floors were bright but a little worn. Streamers were strung up on the ceiling, balloons were tied down to the tables. It was almost hard to imagine something bad possibly happening in such a happy place.

The thought made his skin crawl.

"I'm back!"

Teddy returned with another person by his side. They were dressed in some sort of black rever-collared jacket with white stripes going up the arms. Their face was covered by a white mask with red-painted cheeks and lips. Purple tears streamed down from the empty-looking eyeholes and clashed with the large smile carved into it.

"This is Mari. As if now, she's the final say in whether you guys can you do your thing or not!"

Teddy left again after walking Mari a little closer to the group.

She stared at them with what Foxy assumed was an expectant look, but it was hard to know for sure with the mask.

They repeated themselves once more.

"You guys must have a serious grudge against this guy to be doing this by yourselves."

"You could say I do, at least. A grudge that I've been holding for longer than I've wanted to," Baby said, her voice slightly muffled by her hand.

"Well—" Mari started, but then cut herself off. "Wait a second... you remind me of somebody."

Suddenly, she pulled her mask off, revealing brown eyes and long, messy brown hair.

She reminded Foxy of the woman that he had seen behind the dumpster.

His skin crawled again.

"...Elizabeth?"

Baby blinked in confusion. Then realization seemed to dawn on her. "Charlie? Charlie Emily?"

Foxy looked between the two, one of his thin eyebrows raised in question. "Do… do you two know each other or something?"

"Yeah, we do. It's been forever, Elizabeth."

"It has been a while. I don't even know how you hell you recognized me." A small smile grazed Baby's lips for a moment. "And please, call me Riley. I don't go by Elizabeth anymore."

"Riley," Charlie repeated. "You may be about fifteen years older but that doesn't mean your face is completely unrecognizable. And you've still got that star-shaped scar on the back of your hand from… y’know."

Baby pulled her hand away from her face.

Bon-Bon turned to look at her. "I thought you said that was from a firework."

"Yeah, well, I also said that I'm naturally a redhead but that's just not actually true, is it?"

"Wait," Foxy interrupted, "how do you guys know each other? I'm so confused."

"Our dads used to work together when we were younger. We were friends and I bothered her a ton when she was in the hospital," Charlie explained.

"I wouldn't say you bothered me. It was more like you kept me from losing it," Riley mumbled. "So, what are you doing here? I never thought you'd be the type to work at a place like this."

"I'm not. I'm… sorta doing what you guys are doing. I heard Afton was back so I came to put a stop to him. He's dangerous."

"Is this like a vengeance thing for you too, or...?" Bon-Bon trailed off.

"Afton took my brother from me. So yes, I guess you could say that."

Teddy abruptly re-entered the room. "How're things going in here? Have you made a decision yet?"

Charlie turned to face the shorter man. "Yeah, you can trust them. Trust me on that."


	9. The Chase

With permission granted, Foxy, Freddy, Ballora, and Baby loitered around the pizzeria for a total of three days. During that time, aside from keeping an eye out for William, they caught Charlie up on what they had experienced so far.

The pizzeria was far busier than Foxy’s workplace had ever been. In a way, it made him worry that if Afton did show up, they wouldn't even be able to spot him within the sea of people. Especially since nobody was too sure what he looked like.

Baby had given a rough description of Afton: around 6’0”, dark brown hair, gray eyes, crooked nose, thin eyebrows, and a small gap between his front teeth. But she couldn’t give much else since she hadn’t seen him in so long, so all they could really do was stay vigilant.

In an attempt to cover more area, they had all taken up different parts of the restaurant to look over. Freddy was hanging around the first set of party rooms, Baby was in the main hallway, Ballora was lingering around the prize corner that Charlie manned, and Foxy was by the second set of party rooms in the back.

The second set of party rooms were probably the least busy part of the entire establishment. Most likely because people wanted to be closer to the performers and the loud music they played, rather than far away in the back where sound started to become distant.

Maybe a few kids would run in and out, or a parent would come in for a moment looking for a few minutes of peace and quiet, but that was it, really.

Still, Foxy stayed alert. He didn't like the possibility of somebody else getting murdered because he hadn’t been paying enough attention.

This particular day was especially quiet. He had only seen about three people in the past two hours, so Foxy had started to pace up and down the hall that connected the two rooms, glancing into them each time he passed by.

It wasn't until after about thirty minutes that something actually caught his eye.

Foxy took a few steps back.

A person stood beside one of the tables in the second party room.

A boy, maybe about eight or nine.

Harmless.

Foxy began to continue forward, only to immediately stop again.

A man stepped out from where he had been hidden moments before behind the doorframe.

For a second, Foxy figured that the man must have been the boy’s father, but something about him was just… off. The man gave off odd vibes that made Foxy's skin crawl.

He was dressed in a purple polo shirt and black pants that had a large hole in one of the knees.

He was tall and thin; very, very thin. His gaunt face was framed by stringy dark brown hair that fell in front of his cold gray eyes, which were very deep-set into his head. Then there was the smile he had plastered on his face. It was as if he was trying to grin as wide as humanly possible.

And he had a gap between his front teeth.

It was Afton. It had to be.

"Hi there, what's your name?”

The voice matched the one that Foxy had heard in the basement too. It was raspy. Uneven. And now that he was actually talking instead of just laughing, it was clear that he had a British accent.

"My name's Jacob…” The kid sniffled. I don't know where my parents went."

Foxy froze.

Afton was there. He was right there in front of him again.

"It’s okay. If you follow me, I can help you find them.”

Without thinking, Foxy quickly stepped into the room and stood protectively in front of the kid, resisting the urge to cower slightly under the cold gaze that immediately stabbed through his skull.

"Hey there, kiddo. Your parents are looking for you. It's important, I guess. Come on." He was painfully aware of how much his voice shook when he spoke and was slightly surprised that he managed to get any words out at all.

Foxy didn't actually know if the kid's parents were looking for him, or if they had something important to say to him. He was just trying to get Jacob to choose him over Afton.

"Oh, alright…”

Foxy grabbed Jacob’s hand.

Afton quickly backed out of the room and vanished.

Foxy figured that he should probably actually take the kid back to his parents, just in case Afton reappeared and tried to approach him again.  
But if Afton didn't and instead decided to leave, then Foxy needed to figure out which way he went before he was long gone.

They were looking for him, after all.

What was he going to do?

Foxy made his way into the main hallway and found Baby, explaining everything all in one breath as he sped past her and into the main showroom.

She continued to stand there for a moment, clearly attempting to process the wave of information he had just dumped onto her.

Foxy located Jacob's parents as quickly as he could -- the boy had to tell him what they looked like -- and gave him back to them. "Here's your kid. I'd keep a better eye on him if I were you." And without any further explanation, he ran off again.

He needed to find the rest of his friends.

He should have known the general areas they were in, but his brain wasn't working properly.

Everything was happening very fast all of a sudden.

He passed by the front door.

It opened.

Somebody's hand reached in and grabbed his arm.

Foxy let out a small shriek, only to realize it was Freddy.

"C-come on, Foxy! You have to g-get in the car. We're f-following after Afton!"

Freddy dragged him over to their parked car, threw open one of the rear doors, and pulled him into the back seat alongside Ballora.

"Put your seatbelt on quickly.”

"Yeah, this might get a little intense, Fox."

Charlie was in the front passenger seat, and Baby was in the driver's seat.

Foxy’s eyes went wide when he realized.

Baby didn't have a driver's license. It was suspended because she had a bunch of speeding tickets and traffic violations.

"Uh, Riley, shouldn't you—"

"There's no time to switch seats," she interrupted, apparently already aware of what he was going to say.

She then proceeded to very suddenly slam her foot on the gas pedal and speed out of the parking lot, taking a sharp right turn that made his shoulder hit the window.

Apparently, they were following a beat-up, slightly rusty white car.

At least, that's what Foxy assumed since there were no other cars on the dirt-filled back road they were now on, which he was sorta thankful for since he was certain that Baby would crash into any other vehicles that got near them with the way she was driving.

Afton's car took a left turn down a nearly invisible road obscured by trees.

Baby took a left too, nearly hitting both a tree and a fence.

By this point, everyone in the car was shouting things. Mostly driving advice.

Bon-Bon was just screaming.

But Foxy wasn't really listening to any of it. He was too busy gripping onto the passenger assist handle for dear life.

Afton took a turn onto the grass, completely abandoning the road.

Baby followed, of course, barely avoiding multiple trees.

Everyone was _still_ shouting.

It was overwhelming. _All_ of this was overwhelming.

Baby must've decided that she had had enough because she _turned around_ to tell everybody to shut up. "If you all don't stop shouting,” she started, “I'm going to lose it."

"Well, if you were driving properly, we wouldn't need to shout!" Bon-Bon shouted.

"I don't need sass from a puppet. Shut up."

"Baby, eyes in front of you, please!" Foxy said.

Freddy gasped, "D-don't call h-him a puppet!"

"He _is_ a puppet. And his screaming combined with your guys' shouting is making it hard to concentrate!"

"Concentrate? Hah. That would require brain cells, which you don't have. Don't make me laugh."

"Eyes in front of you!" Foxy repeated.

"I'll tie your ears around your neck, Cotton-tail. Shut it!"

"We really don't need to argue right now," Ballora began.

"Oh-ho-ho, I'd beg to differ."

"I swear to Scott once I get out of this car, I'll—"

"Guys, cool it. Now is definitely not the time for this," Charlie interrupted.

"You'll what?"

"I don't fucking know, but you won't like it. I'll tell you that."

"Real intimidating, that is. Could you really not come up with something better?"

"Bon-Bon, s-stop talking!" Freddy pleaded.

"I mean, seriously, is there anything at all in that head of yours?"

"I'll make you regret—"

"Eyes in front of you!" Foxy shouted as loud as he could.

"Fine!" Baby finally turned back around but continued arguing. She hardly ever got angry. And when she did, it usually wasn't because of others. She didn't blink when people -- usually upset customers -- shouted at her. She was typically the calmest out of them in an intense situation.

Foxy was still surprised that she had blown up like that.

And that she was still going.

It was a miracle that the only things they had managed to hit were a few branches, which snapped off the trees they were attached to upon making contact with the windshield.

Baby finally swerved out of the woods and onto an unrecognizable road.

There were a few other cars around, but Baby and Afton didn't slow down. At all.

Afton took a right.

She took a right, running over the curb a bit.

He took another right.

She took another right.

He sped past a red light.

A car pulled out of a gas station parking lot after he did so, stopping in front of the same light.

Baby slammed on the brakes. The tires screeched, and they barely managed to stop in time.

Afton was long gone by the time she managed to get around the car.

She let out practically every variation of fuck known to man and hit her head against the steering wheel repeatedly. Once she was done with that, she got out of the car and started to kick a trash can that she had parked by.

Everyone else eventually got out too, deciding not to join Baby in the slow destruction of public property.

"Oh, would you look at that," Bon-Bon said. "He got away. I simply cannot believe it."

Baby whipped around. "I wouldn't start with that again if I were you. We're not in the car anymore, asshole. Nothing's in my way."

"What's the plan, Red? You gonna show me what you learned from your dad?"

The redhead was all up in the puppet's face in an instant.

Foxy never thought that he'd see a grown woman get in a heated and long-lasting argument with a stuffed rabbit, but here they were.

"Oh, _you_ don't get to say something like that," she hissed. She had that wild, unfamiliar look in her eyes. The one she had when the body was found behind the dumpster.

It was a little unsettling.

Ballora stepped in between the two. "Bon-Bon, please watch what you say and stop trying to provoke Riley. Riley, please take a deep breath and try to calm down. You're not going to do anything to Freddy's best friend, are you?"

"No," she mumbled, backing up. "Sorry."

Then, abruptly, Baby started off down the street at a brisk pace.

"I'll be back. Don't go anywhere."

And that was the only explanation she gave before she disappeared around a corner.


	10. Old Tech

Baby came back around a half an hour later, seemingly cooled off and back to her usual demeanor: bored.

Everyone had been sitting in a diner while they waited for her. It was right across from where she had sloppily parked.

It was a friendly little place with a vintage feel.

They had short conversations with one another -- and with their waitress.

When Baby walked in, the little bell above the door alerted everyone else of her presence.

"Where did you go?" Ballora asked.

Baby tossed some keys onto their table, not sitting down. "I got us a room at a motel down the road. We're pretty far from home and it's getting late. We'll figure out what we're gonna do next tomorrow."

"Alright, well, let us pay the bill first and then we can leave."

Foxy went to pull his wallet out but Baby stopped him. "Nah, I'll pay for your guys' bill. C'mon."

Of course, he told her that she didn't have to do that. But to no one's surprise, she ended up doing it anyway.

And with that, they said their goodbyes to the waitress and left the diner.

To everybody's relief, Charlie was the one to take the wheel so that they could repark the car near the motel, which turned out to be rather old looking.

The flickering neon sign near the entrance read, _'Benedict Motel'._

After traveling up the set of stairs to the upper floor and unlocking the door, they were greeted with a room that was just as old-looking as the outside of the building.

"You'll have to share beds."

Foxy looked between the two ancient-looking beds. Two people could fit in one, but that'd leave somebody out. "There's definitely only enough room for four people and a puppet in those beds. That leaves one person out."

"It's fine, I'll just take the chair." Baby jabbed her thumb in the direction of a singular wooden chair in the corner of the room.

"That looks uncomfortable."

"I'll live," she said. "Now sleep. We're getting up early tomorrow."

Nobody really argued.

A part of Foxy wanted to, but truthfully, he was really tired. He hadn't slept at all well while they were watching over the pizzeria. He couldn't.

He practically passed out on one of the beds not long after she said that.

When the morning finally rolled around, Foxy found himself waking up earlier than he expected to. It was still dark when he opened his eyes. He could tell thanks to the crooked blinds, which left part of the window exposed.

Everyone else was still asleep.

Freddy and Charlie were practically falling off the beds and onto the floor, Ballora was sleeping on her side, and Baby was sitting uncomfortably in the chair, her feet propped up on the rickety table next to her.

Foxy questioned whether he should wake the others up or just go back to sleep. He was about to settle on going back to sleep right when the flip phone sitting on the table started to ring.

Baby groaned, moving her feet before she grabbed it and answered it. "Hello?" She always had the volume on her phone cranked up, so it wasn't really all that hard for Foxy to hear the person on the other end.

"Riley? It's Michael. Dad just showed up at your work."

Foxy didn't say anything. He pretended to be asleep again the moment she started moving.

"Oh, did he? What'd he do, Michael? I already know he did something. Is he still there?"

"Not anymore. He got away."

Baby repeated her second question again, "What'd he do?"

"He got in through the little window in your guys' basement. The one that was all boarded up. He stole a box that was in there. Managed to spill some of the contents while he was leaving too. I don't really know what they are. They're these… little discs."

Baby furrowed her brows. "Hm. I have no idea what you’re talking about. We'll drop by and check them out."

"You know, I feel like he's up to something big again."

"You think?"

"Well, he doesn't seem like he's being careful or calculated right now, which is weird. It's like he's in a rush or something."

"You might be right, but I'm hoping not. I'm not ready to deal with this shit again. See you when we get back."

"Alright, bye."

She ended the call and sighed, "Alright, Fox. You want to wake the others up? It's time to get going again."

Foxy rolled back over to face her. "How did you know I was awake?"

"I saw you lay back down before I answered the phone."

"Oh. Well, I guess I'll wake everyone up."

It took a while for Foxy to get every up and ready to go. Well, it took him a while to get Freddy up, anyway.

The drive back home was just as quiet as the drive away from it, but the silence wasn't quite as painful.

They found Michael standing in the parking lot when they pulled in.

He jogged up to his sister the moment she got out of the car and placed a small disc in her hand. It was about the size of a half-dollar coin.

Baby turned the disc over in her hand, inspecting it. "Oh, this is definitely something from either William's old workshop or the storage warehouse. I don't know why this is was in the basement, though. I thought we threw all of his shit away when he 'died' the first time."

"But do you know what it is?" Michael asked.

"Fuck no. I don't know anything about technology." She turned to Charlie. "You said that you're good with this kind of stuff. Can you figure out what this thing is?"

Charlie took the disc from her. "Probably."

"Okay, while you do that we're going to start heading to the warehouse first."

Ballora raised an eyebrow. "We are?"

"Yeah, we are. It's closer than the workshop. And if William's planning on continuing where he left off at all, then he's going to visit it at some point. He'd never abandon his precious creations unless they turned on him or he found something better."

"Do you remember where the warehouse and workshop are?" Michael asked.

"Of course. I couldn't forget even if I tried."


	11. The Warehouse

Only a few days ago, their road to finding any answers at all seemed so far away. And now, well, Foxy supposed they were still far away because the storage warehouse was quite out of the way. Practically out of town, actually.

In a way, Foxy didn't mind. Yeah, he knew what he had signed up for. But it wasn't going to make him any less apprehensive to enter the probably decrepit building they were heading towards.

He couldn't stop thinking about what fun surprises may have been awaiting them behind the warehouse's old walls. Perhaps his imagination was a bit wild, but he wasn't jumping to particularly pleasant things.

Baby's voice snapped him out of his thoughts. "Take a right."

He glanced to the right, finding only grass and trees. "But there's no road."

"I know. Turn right."

"Okay." He shrugged, taking the car off the road and onto the grass.

"This place really is out there," Charlie commented.

"Yeah."

"Any idea what we might find when we go in there?" Foxy asked.

"Not really, no. I don't know what's in there anymore."

Oh, so it was going to be a surprise. How fun.

"Turn up at that tree over there. It's just down that way."

"Got it."

Foxy turned again, finally finding a building in front of him.

He started to feel more uneasy as he slowed down to park.

But maybe that was just because he was afraid of seeing Afton in person again.

Or perhaps it was because things didn't seem to be going right for them so far, and he was scared it would continue to go that way while they were in there.

But who knew?

"We're here," he muttered shakily.

Baby and Charlie were first to get out with everyone else following after, Foxy being the last.

He tried to really take in the warehouse.

It was a wide building with a rounded roof and it leaned a little to the left, looking like it might collapse. Overgrown plants crept up its walls and obscured its high windows, which were mostly broken.

"Let's go." Baby shoved a flashlight into Foxy's grasp.

He hesitantly followed after her, taking the cracked concrete path up to the two doors at the front. One was clearly made for vehicles to unload and get boxes/crates inside, and the other was just for people.

Freddy tried to open the second door, but it wouldn't budge.

Foxy laughed awkwardly, "Shoot, it looks like we can't go inside."

"Nonsense." Baby brought her foot up and kicked the door as hard as she could right beside the handle.

Before Foxy could say anything about how that probably wouldn't work, it opened and fell off the hinges, crashing to the floor with a large cloud of dust.

At the look of surprise on his face, she shrugged and said, "Door is as old and dilapidated as the rest of the place. It wasn't hard."

They all passed over the fallen door and entered, finding their path blocked by another wall and door. It looked out of place, as if it had been added well after the rest of the building was already finished.

"Well, that wasn't here before." Baby walked over to the door, placing her hand on the old wood to push it open. It also fell off of the hinges, hitting the floor loudly. "Oh, alright."

Foxy followed her through the now bare doorframe, being greeted with a dim space seemingly partitioned by more makeshift walls, crates, boxes, and other things he couldn't quite make out. The light from the windows did little to illuminate anything in the early morning.

He walked closer to the railing of the rickety makeshift catwalk he now stood on.

Practically everything was on a lower level. From what little of the seemingly unfinished walls he could see, somebody had torn open the floor and dug down.

"This certainly doesn't look like your average storage warehouse," he commented quietly. He was keeping his voice down because he could hear noises coming from somewhere else in the building.

"Yeah, what whackjob designed this place?" Bon-Bon asked from where he was sticking out of Freddy's backpack. "This is stupid."

"William did," Baby answered simply. "I guess when people finally stopped coming around, he took it as an opportunity to renovate. Turn this place into what he really wanted."

"Wh-what's with all the n-n-noise?"

"We'll have to find out." Baby turned on her flashlight, pointing it at the floor. "Follow me. Stay close, and keep your flashlights low."

Foxy was sure the catwalk would break beneath their feet as they descended down the stairs, but by some miracle of Scott, it didn't.

Once they actually set foot on the lower level, they were greeted by a foul odor.

It took most of Foxy’s willpower to not audibly gag.

Bon-Bon was the one to complain about it. "Scott, it smells like something fucking died down here."

"Something probably did," Baby muttered.

Foxy tried to pin the smell on something else. Maybe it was the moldy wood on the crates? Whatever was making the floor sticky?

He hoped it was one of those things.

Navigating the obstructions and fake walls proved to be a challenge. It was like they were in a maze.

"Wait, wh-what's th-that over there?"

Charlie shined her flashlight onto something that was poking out from behind a crate.

It was a hand.

"It's just some old junk." Baby walked closer to it.

Nobody followed her.

She tugged on the arm, which caused the machine it was attached to fall onto its side.

"Yeah, see? Just a broken animatronic."

She then looked into the space that it had been blocking moments before.

She waved everyone over and stepped over the animatronic. "Actually, come over here. We're going this way. There's a door back here."

This door, unlike the first two they encountered, appeared to be somewhat new as it showed almost no age and didn't fall off the hinges when they tried to open it.

A T-shaped hallway lit by a single light bulb that hung from the ceiling greeted them.

At one end of the crossbar, there was some sort of emergency exit. At the other, they found a door identical to the one they had just passed through.

They went through the second one.

There was some sort of dusty office behind it. Endless stacks of papers sat atop uneven desks, a few desk chairs were strewn about, and dirty windows stretched nearly the length of every wall, minus one. That wall was covered by a cork bulletin board with various pictures, newspaper articles, and various other documents pinned to it.

Charlie had just stepped up to examine it when Foxy noticed Ballora wearing an odd expression.

"You okay?" he asked her.

"You hear that too, don't you?"

He blinked in confusion. "Hear what? I don't hear anything."

"It's… breathing, I think. Loud and uneven breathing."

Foxy strained his ears but still heard nothing.

He wondered for a moment if the bluenette was imagining things.

He was about to ask if she was positive about the sound when she very abruptly started off towards another room.

"It's coming from this direction."

"Hey, wait a second!"

She didn't stop.

Foxy quickly made his way over to the others, who were all in front of that bulletin board.

"Um, guys? Ballora just went into another room because she apparently hears breathing."

"Which room?" Charlie asked.

Foxy jabbed his thumb in the direction the dancer went. The vague shape of her was visible through one of those grimy windows.

"Well, let's follow her."

With that, everyone jogged to catch up with Ballora, who didn't slow down even slightly.

She stopped right in front of an old door. "It's in here," she whispered.

"Be prepared to move if we need to." Baby stepped forward and slowly turned the doorknob.

She pushed open the door as quietly as possible.

They found another office, one that was far emptier than the first.

The sound finally became audible to Foxy.

It was definitely breathing.

They walked a little further into the room, moving past a desk that was somewhat blocking the door.

That was when they saw it.

The thing was positioned in the corner of the room, not visible at first due to a stack of boxes obstructing it from view.

It appeared to be an admittedly nasty amalgamation of wires, synthetic gold fur, rotting human parts, and metal.

It sat on the floor with what was left of its arms sprawled uselessly at its side, legs haphazardly up to its chest, and barely attached head lolling to the side.

White, pinprick dots stared up at them from large, pitch-black eyeholes as it twitched uncontrollably.

Repulsive, truly.

Foxy wasn't sure if he was hallucinating it due to the fumes in the building or if he was actually seeing it.

He looked to the others beside him, trying to figure out if they saw it too.

Judging by the blank/disgusted/horrified looks he saw on their faces, they did.

It was real.

What were they gonna do?

Try and go past it?

Run away?

Foxy was definitely leaning more towards that second option when Baby suddenly mumbled something from beside him. "A fate worse than death."

"What?"

She ignored him and began to approach the thing.

"What are you doing!?" he hissed.

He tried to grab her arm and pull her back.

He wasn't successful.

The redhead simply waved him off, silently getting closer.

The eyes of the creature slowly shifted their focus from the rest of the group to just her.

She stopped a few inches away from it, kneeling down as her friends continuing to watch from where they stood a good few feet away.

Her voice came out as dead quiet whisper that everyone could just barely hear.

"Hello, Miles. It's been a while."

It… he? He raised his head up slightly. His mouth, which had been agape, closed for a moment before he tried to speak. **"A long while. I thought Father would have dragged your bodybag in here by now."** His voice sounded quite like death. It was raspy, low, and garbled like he was choking on something; almost difficult to understand with its distortion.

"I'm quite hard to get rid of, I can assure you. Have some more faith in me. I'm not the same little girl you used to know."

**"Oh, I know,"** he said. **"And you should know that your disguise doesn't fool him, that he still wants you and Michael back in the family, and he's found a new way to make that happen."**

"New toys?"

**"Yes. More dangerous than the ones from Michael's childhood. More nightmarish."**

There was a short pause.

"Hey Charlie, did you ever figure out what that disc was?"

She blinked, clearly not expecting to be spoken to. "Uh, yeah. It’s some sort of illusion maker. It emits a high-pitched frequency that's supposed to overload the human brain, changing the listener's perception of whatever the emitter wants them to see."

"Huh… that sounds… vaguely familiar for some reason. Why does that sound familiar to me?"

A few of the distant noises began to grow louder.

Squeaking joints, the sound of something scraping/dragging across the concrete floors almost rhythmically, heavy footsteps.

**"They're here. They're looking for you. And they're not going to stop until they have you."**

Foxy finally found his voice again. "Then we oughta get outta here fast."

"No," Baby back stood up, "not 'we'. Just you guys."

"What?" Ballora shook her head in disapproval. "You're not staying here by yourself. That's stupid."

"Yeah, we did _not_ do all of that convincing to let you block us out again."

"Well, that was _before_ I knew there would be multiple killer machines involved. Now that I do, you're all out again."

"No, we're staying. Let us help you," Foxy said with as much firmness as he could muster.

"You heard Miles. They're not looking for you goofs. They're looking for me, so they're gonna deal with me." 

The sounds kept getting louder, and everyone had brought their voices down to a harsh whisper.

"I told you all earlier that I wasn't going to let you guys do anything too dangerous. You're leaving. Take the emergency exit."

"We aren't—!"

Baby slammed a door in Foxy's face before he could finish his sentence.

She had been slowly backing into the room in front of them and nobody had noticed.

As expected, she locked the door before any of them could run up and try and open it.

Foxy brought his fists against the metal door. "I swear to Scott, you better open this door!"

"C'mon, B-baby! Don't d-do this!"

"Open the door, please!"

"Don't be fucking stupid."

"Let us in!"

There was no response.

A loud crash rang through the air.

Those heavy, dragging, metal footsteps picked up speed.

"Riley!"

Still no response.

Foxy whipped around to face the others. "What are we supposed to do now? We have to do something, right?"


	12. Lending a Hand

"Of course we have to do something!"

"Well then Dancy-pants, how the hell do you propose we get past the door to follow after her?"

"Maybe we don't have to go through that door. This place has tons of doors. Maybe there's another one that can get us in there?" Charlie offered.

"Okay, so let's say you're right. How're we supposed to find the right one fast enough? The clown could have her eyeballs being shoved down her throat by the time we find a way in."

Ballora gasped, "Don't say things like that!"

"Fine, Mom. Stop yelling at me."

"Guys, let's not get off track here!"

"Hold on, Fox-boy. I just came up with another good one—"

"Bon-Bon, st-stop it!"

"No, I don't want to."

**"If you could all find a way to cease your bickering for a moment, you may find that I could be of assistance to you."**

Everybody went quiet and turned towards Miles, who they had somehow managed to forget was in the room with them.

Once he was sure no one would start up again, he continued talking. **"Thank you. Charlie is right. There is another way in. But it's not a door."**

Foxy followed the golden amalgamation's eyes and found a vent slightly obscured by a desk.

It was decently sized. If they could get the vent cover off, then they could definitely crawl through it.

"That's it! That's our way in!" He jogged over and pulled the desk aside. "Freddy, you still have the screwdriver Riley packed, right?"

"I th-think so!"

"I'll look." Charlie unzipped Freddy's backpack and located the tool.

Foxy stepped aside so that she could unscrew the four screws holding on the vent cover. He turned his attention to Miles again. "Any advice before we go after her?"

**"This won't be the end of your journey. And moving forward, you must take more caution. Elizabeth's obsession will be her end. She is smart, but she can also be impulsive. Especially where Father is concerned. He brings out a different side of her."**

"D-d-different side?"

**"Yes. Different side. You have noticed, haven't you?"**

"Yeah..."

**"Oh, and please know that Father isn't here anymore. He's already left."**

"Cover's off!" Charlie announced, breaking up the conversation.

"Okay then, we're going after her." Foxy took a deep breath. "Do you just want us to leave you here...?"

**"It may not appear so, but I have my own ways out of here. I haven't left because I knew Father would return. He did. He came back. And now I must continue to follow him around because I'm afraid that I can't do much else. Not anymore..."** he said. **"Good luck."**

With that, he just vanished.

Foxy rubbed his eyes to make sure he wasn't losing it, and Miles was still just… gone.

For some reason, he didn't feel as shocked as he should have.

Finally, Foxy crawled into the vent after the others.

They were pretty far in, so he had to crawl rather fast and rather noisily to catch up.

Eventually, they came to a split in the vent. Two possible directions in front of them.

They ended up going left because a loud crash echoed from that direction. Something was clearly going on over there.

And luckily, when they reached the end of the path, they found that the vent cover had already been taken off so exiting was easy.

The room they now stood in made it feel like they had just stepped into a half-built house that people just gave up on. The floor beneath them seemed like it might break if they put too much pressure on it.

Everyone pulled out their flashlights again.

"Okay, where should we go next? There were noises coming from over here just a moment ago..."

"I dunno, pretty boy. maybe we should follow that blood trail on the floor."

Foxy frowned at Bon-Bon before directing his gaze to the floor, where there was indeed a blood trail. Small little spatters that were somewhat far apart from one another, seemingly forming a sporadic path. It must've been fresh, on account of the fact that it hadn't dried up yet.

"This has to be hers, right? Miles said Afton was long gone already, and animatronics don't bleed..."

"I think that's a safe assumption," Ballora agreed. "Hopefully, she's not badly injured if that is the case."

"Hopefully _we_ don't get badly injured," Bon-Bon muttered.

The group took a turn around a corner.

The entire space was much darker than the offices and the maze of crates and mechanical parts.

It was much quieter too.

Or at least, it _was_ quieter.

A loud noise rang out. It sounded like something being knocked over, and it came from the other side of one of the walls they stood near.

The group came to a stop.

"You guys heard _that_ , right?" Ballora whispered.

"Yeah..." Foxy whispered back.

He was about to ask if anybody had any clue what could've caused it, or if they should head over and try to investigate, but didn't quite get the opportunity.

The wall beside him splintered open.

Someone -- _something_ , burst through it.

It had to be at least eight feet tall.

Its malleable plastic covering had a weird fleshy quality to it and was covered with various gashes, exposing bits of the metal framework underneath.

It had absurdly long claws at the ends of its fingers and various rows of teeth that lined its multiple jaws.

It… sort of resembled a rabbit. Well, a deformed, twisted, evil version of a rabbit.

Foxy did not have much time to process this information before the rabbit grabbed him, its claws digging into his flesh.

He screamed. He screamed as loud as he possibly could.

"Foxy!" everybody collectively yelled.

He was lifted into the air, and its grip on him quickly began to grow tighter.

It felt like his ribs were going to break.

The others, presumably acting out of panic, threw their flashlights at its head.

They bounced off and hit the floor.

The rabbit’s form flickered briefly, its synthetic flesh becoming a slightly translucent rubber covering that looked a lot like an extremely cheap Halloween costume.

Its grip loosened for a moment, and then it got even tighter.

Foxy couldn’t breathe. Was this how he was going to die? Being slowly crushed to death was pretty high up on his list of terrible ways to die, so he wasn't all that thrilled.

"Let go of him!"

_CLANG!_

A large pipe struck the animatronic in the face, getting lodged in a large hole right next to one of its eye sockets.

It began to glitch and flicker again, finally dropping Foxy onto the floor.

He gasped for air, unable to pick himself back up.

He wasn't even entirely sure what had just happened.

Something else struck that thing's head, causing its form to flicker more rapidly.

Foxy's eyes followed the direction of the throw, and he found somebody with a familiar head of red hair approaching from the end of the hall. "Riley!" he sputtered out.

She appeared far more disheveled than the last time they saw her, which couldn't have been more than twenty minutes ago. A thick line of blood trailed from behind her hairline and all way down her pale freckled face. Her jacket was practically hanging off of one of her shoulders, and her white t-shirt was stained red and blue.

"What are you all doing here? I told you to leave!"

Ballora raised an eyebrow. "Did you really think we were going to listen to you?"

Baby sighed and pulled Foxy to his feet. "You alright, Fox?"

"I think so."

The rabbit finally pulled the pipe out of its face.

"Okay, That's good. Now come on, I think Bonnie over there is regaining his senses."

Foxy barely managed to thank Baby before he was grabbed by the arm and dragged further down the dark hallway, everybody else following behind.

It was difficult for him to keep up with the redhead's long strides. He nearly tripped over his own feet multiple times before she finally let go of him.

Judging by the strange gurgling and clanking noise behind them, that thing -- uh, Bonnie? Bonnie was definitely following after them.

"Where are we g-going?" Freddy asked.

They were about to take a right, but an even bigger animatronic -- a brown bear with a black top hat and a second mouth on its stomach -- started to push its way through a stack of boxes that had been partially blocking the path.

"Not this way, apparently!"

Charlie pulled Ballora out of the way of a box that was flying at her head.

Everybody skidded to a halt and started heading in the opposite direction.

Both animatronics were a lot faster than they looked.

The group came across a door as they rounded another corner.

"In here!" Baby whisper-yelled.

Everyone piled into the room and shut the door right before the bear and rabbit came around the same corner.

They held their breaths as the two loudly passed by the door.

Eventually, the animatronic’s uneven footsteps faded entirely.

"You think we're safe in here?" Foxy tore his eyes away from the door to check the room for any more unwanted surprises, but couldn't make out very much in the darkness.

"Should be," Charlie said, trying to catch her breath. "Which should give us time to figure out what we're going to do about those things. Any ideas?"

"Uhh..." Foxy found his mind blank. He was too wary of things possibly hiding in the shadows to think properly. "I can't think. It's too dark."

They really should have attempted to recollect their flashlights before running away.

"Okay, hold on." Baby reached into one of her jacket pockets and pulled out her lighter, popping the top off with her thumb.

_CLINK._

A small flame began to cast a dim light on a portion of the space around him.

She always carried a lighter, despite the fact that she didn't smoke. It was really just something that she fidgeted with, Foxy was pretty sure.

"Better?"

"Yeah. Slightly."

"You know, I think that lighter just gave me an idea."

"Alright, Shortie. Don't leave us hanging. Share your brilliant plan with us.”

Charlie frowned at Bon-Bon. "Alright, first off, I am not short. Second, I think we could—"

She was cut off by the sound of something hitting the floor beside them. They only had time to look in the direction it came from before it hit the floor again, breaking through it.

It wasn't the bear or the rabbit, instead, it was a rust-colored, barnacle-covered fox with a large crack across its muzzle.

With a loud screech, it swung its sharp hook hand at them, still attempting to pull its lower half free.

"Hold that thought, we're gonna have to find a new spot." Baby stuffed her lighter back into her pocket and threw the door open.

The pirate swung its hook again, catching Foxy by the back of his red sweatshirt.

He let out a strangled choking noise as it yanked him back.

Charlie picked up a metal rod and jammed it into one of the machine’s red eyes.

It began to sputter and twitch.

Freddy took that opportunity to unhook Foxy's sweatshirt and pull him away.

With him free, they all ran out of the room and down the hallway, which had a set of metal double doors at the end of it.

"Everyone through those doors!"

Baby threw one of the doors open with her shoulder. She waited until all five of them were in before slamming it closed.

Charlie grabbed a couple of old planks of wood off the floor and pushed them through the handles to prevent the doors from being opened.

"Okay, nice thinking,” Foxy said, “but I’m not sure if that’s gonna be enough.”

The pirate started to ram against the doors.

There was a faint cracking sound from one of the planks.

"Yeah, you're right. Come on, we're gonna have to block the doors ourselves."

All of them hastily joined Charlie in pushing against the doors as hard as they could to keep the animatronic out. With their combined force, they remained firmly shut.

But the fox continued to ram into them anyway, still emitting that horrible screech. It was like a knife being scraped against a glass bottle.

"Charlie, could you please share the rest of that idea with us now?"


	13. Up in Flames and Down Into the Depths

"Yeah, I—" Charlie was cut off by the bear joining in and delivering a particularly hard blow to the doors, one that made everyone's shoes slide across the floor a good five inches.

Once they managed to regain their footing, she continued. "I think we ought to light them on fire."

"Light them on fire," Foxy repeated before looking at Charlie, who was right beside him. "You think that will actually get rid of these things?"

"Well, I don't see why it _wouldn't_. Plus, I can't think of too many other options right now. We can use Riley's lighter."

The wooden planks blocking the door began to splinter a bit.

"We _could_ do that, Shortstop. But a lighter isn't going to take out a big ass animatronic all by itself."

"Then we'll douse them in gasoline first," Riley said as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

"Okay, where exactly are we supposed to get that?"

"We already have it."

Foxy raised an eyebrow, "Wait, you _brought_ gasoline? Did you know we were gonna have to set things on fire?"

"No, it was supposed to be for the car. But I guess we can use it to light them up."

Well, that explained why Riley had taken an inordinate amount of time to fill the car with gas when they had stopped at a station. "Where is it?"

"In Fred's bag. It's in water bottles. Couldn’t find that jerrycan we have.”

"I thought that was urine," Bon-Bon commented.

"It's not urine. Lor, can you reach into his bag and grab any water bottle you find, please?"

"I can try."

Ballora reached over into Freddy's bag and started rummaging around. It felt like forever before she found anything, but maybe that was just because Foxy wasn't used to so much physical activity. His muscles were screaming from all of the running and pushing against the doors to keep the monsters out.

"I can only find three bottles. That should be enough for each one, right?"

"Should be."

"Alright, how do we want to go about this exactly?" Foxy asked.

"I really don't think we're going to have enough time for a detailed plan," Charlie said.

The rabbit joined in.

The wooden planks didn't sound like they were going to last much longer. They were splintering more and more.

"She's right. We're gonna have to wing it. Spray them, light them, and watch the wood!"

With one last great push, the animatronics managed to force their way in.

The wooden planks snapped like twigs, sending splinters all across the room.

The doors flung open so hard that the sound of them hitting the walls probably resonated throughout the entire building.

The damaged machines all clambered in, choosing their targets.

Foxy, who was clutching the bottle that Ballora had handed him, stood stock still as the pirate animatronic's beady red eyes landed on him.

Quick, uneven footsteps closed most of the gap between them.

He tried to back away but found that his body wouldn't move. All he could manage to do was shriek as its sharp, barnacle-covered hook went straight for his head.

"Look out, Fox!"

Foxy felt himself being forced onto the ground.

The hook went shot through the open-air right above him.

Once Riley released her tight grip on his shoulder, Foxy seemed to regain the ability to move.

He tried to spray the contents of the bottle onto the pirate's front. Only a little more than half of the bottle's contents came out.

_CLINK._

The animatronic began to burn. Its ear-splitting screech somehow became louder.

It began to stumble around and tripped over its own feet, falling like a bag of rocks.

Foxy shakily got up, unable to tear his eyes away from the burning metal demon as it writhed about.

In his peripheral vision, he could see the others narrowly avoiding the remaining monsters.

"This one's ready, Red!" Bon-Bon squeaked.

Foxy managed to tear his eyes away from the pirate just in time to see Freddy’s arm get sliced open by the bear’s claws and to see Riley set it ablaze.

The bear nearly fell into the unfinished wooden walls, but Ballora managed to draw it away before it collapsed face-first onto the floor.

"This one's ready too!" Charlie called.

The blue-gray rabbit lit up.

It flailed around a bit before falling like all of the others.

As the slightly burning remains finally stilled, Foxy slowly turned to look at Riley. "...Is that it? Is it over?"

All of that felt easy.

_Way_ too easy.

"That can't be it, can it?"

Riley looked as if she was about to say something different, but cut herself off. "The Wolf."

"The what?"

"The Wolf. There's a wolf too, I forgot about The Wolf!"

As if on cue, a blue-eyed, extremely deteriorated, silver-maned wolf animatronic came crashing through the double doors. It knocked right into Charlie, who had unfortunately been standing in its path.

She hit the floor with a painful smack, sliding across the concrete.

With a pained groan, she attempted to awkwardly scramble away before it could actually grab her. 

She wasn't quick enough. The Wolf’s clawed hand managed to get a tight grip on her ankle.

"Let go!" Using her free leg, Charlie began to repeatedly kick it in the nose. Its form flickered with each kick.

"Charlie!" Foxy screwed the cap back onto the water bottle that he was still clutching and threw it over to her. There was less than half left in it, but it was better than nothing.

Despite his somewhat mediocre throw, Charlie still managed to catch it.

She sprayed the remaining gasoline right in The Wolf's face.

It blinked, sputtered, and drew back for a moment before lunging back at her.

The remains of one of the wooden planks struck it across the face and The Wolf stopped short.

As Freddy started to repeatedly hit it over the back of the head, Riley brought her thumb across the flint wheel of her lighter, struggling to get it to work.

Finally, the wick ignited.

The Wolf let out a loud screech, its gasoline-soaked fur bursting into flames.

Riley moved away as fast as she could, but her arms still caught some of the heat. She hissed a string of curse words under her breath, the sleeves of her jacket scorched and the skin of her forearms an angry red.

Ballora helped Charlie back up as The Wolf continued screeching, the noise it was making growing more distorted and painful as it blindly stumbled around.

Unlike the others, it wasn't quite as quick to go down. It took longer for the fire to consume its whole body.

Its form faded to a metal frame and stayed that way.

Then it bumped into one of the two wooden support pillars in the room before anyone could stop it.

Flames began to crawl up the pillar and started eating at the ceiling.

The Wolf began to blindly swipe at Riley, who was stood closest to it.

She narrowly avoided its attacks. "Okay, I think this is our cue to leave!"

It was hard to hear her over the nonstop screeching.

Foxy was about to agree but found himself cut short by a burning piece of debris landing near his feet.

Everyone started heading for the double doors.

_CRUNCH!_

And they stopped.

What remained of The Wolf's metal jaws had just clamped down on Riley's left wrist, its endless rows of sharp teeth digging deep into her flesh.

Since it had just been set on fire, Foxy didn't doubt that its touch was still really hot.

The redhead attempted to repress a scream, only being somewhat successful.

She pulled at its jaws, attempting to free her now -- probably -- broken wrist as she shouted, "Go! Don't wait up for me!"

Foxy shouted back the obvious response to that. "Are you crazy?!"

Of course, the entire group turned back around to try and help her, narrowly avoiding the debris that continued to fall.

They were still a few feet away when The Wolf switched its position, releasing Riley's wrist in favor of tightly wrapping its arms around her, binding hers to her sides. The sharp, jagged pieces sticking out of its body in combination with its high temperature caused another one of those partially repressed cries of pain.

"Go!" she repeated through gritted teeth.

That didn't stop them either.

However, what happened next did.

The pirate, rabbit, and bear dragged themselves up off of the floor like zombies from a grave. Their wide frames blocked the way, rendering Riley’s friends unable to reach her.

Charred metal bodies began to hobble towards them with outstretched arms while The Wolf started dragging Riley to the opposite side of the room, where there was the entrance to a rickety-looking staircase.

Who knew where that led. And down was certainly not the direction they need to go.

The air was growing increasingly thick with smoke.

Foxy, Charlie, Ballora, and Freddy tried to force their way past the animatronics, but they weren't getting very far.

They couldn't get past the animatronics.

But they had to.

They _had_ to.

Riley continued struggling, unable to break free no matter how hard she tried.

Finally, Foxy managed to duck under one of the monsters’ arms when it swung at him. He slipped past it, burning his forearm on the side of its leg in his scrambling.

He pushed himself into a run despite how difficult it was getting to breathe. "Riley!"

The Wolf was in the doorway of the stairwell.

Foxy forced himself to go faster.

It was getting further and further down the stairs.

He was so close.

The ceiling of the stairwell began to bow.

He was inches away.

The ceiling collapsed, filling the stairwell with rubble.


	14. Not Finished Yet

Foxy, Freddy, Charlie, and Ballora tried as hard as they could to clear that staircase, but really, it simply wasn't possible. Especially with those metal monstrosities still on their heels.

Eventually, the fire got too out of control. 

They had to leave.

They didn't want to, but they had to.

The already unstable warehouse collapsed just a few minutes after they stumbled through the front door.

A big cloud of black smoke raced towards them as the building's remains hit the ground, stopping just short of where they all stood.

None of them moved. For how long, they weren't particularly sure.

At some point, rain started to fall from the darkened sky. 

Foxy sat down on a huge slab of concrete that had come out of the pathway, still letting out the occasional cough as he kept his eyes trained on the dying flames.

Nobody came out of the rubble. Not even the skeletal remains of the twisted animatronics.

He felt empty.

He wanted to look away, but he couldn't.

He also wanted to curl up in a ball and disappear, but he couldn't do that either.

Eventually, he felt a hand on his shoulder. He flinched.

"Come on, Foxy. Please get in the car. You'll get sick if you keep sitting out here in the rain like this."

Foxy looked up at Ballora, who, like him, was covered in soot that had grown smudged in the rain. Strands of her dyed hair had come loose from her bun and were hanging in front of her face. 

"We can't leave without her."

"Alex..." 

Hearing her call him by his actual name really cemented the firmness in her voice.

"But… we can't. What if she—"

"I don't think she's coming out." She somewhat gingerly pulled him to his feet by his arm.

"No, no, she has to. She's survived crazy stuff before, right? She can't be...she's not..." Foxy couldn't even get the word out. He didn't want to say it. He didn't want to believe it.

He didn't want his friend to be...

To be dead.

Ballora pulled him into a tight hug. 

Foxy found himself somewhat grateful for the rain. It hid the tears running down his face.

"I don't want it to be true either," she said. "But if she did survive, she probably would have come out by now."

"No..." was all he could get out. Foxy found himself mumbling it again and again as Ballora drew back and led him towards the car.

He rubbed his eyes and begrudgingly got into the car, sitting in the driver's seat once again. He put the key into the ignition but didn't bother turning it.

The vehicle was dead silent for a long time.

Everybody either stared out the window or at their feet.

Nobody wanted to meet anybody else's eyes.

Nobody wanted to talk about it.

But eventually, someone spoke up.

"Wh-wh-what d-do we d-d-do now?"

"I say we call it quits," Bon-Bon muttered.

"We… we can't just call it quits now!" Foxy blurted out after another minute of silence.

His grip on the steering wheel grew increasingly tight as he felt his eyes start to burn again. 

"I… we said we were going to help Riley stop this guy. We can't give up. We haven't completed our goal. At all. Just because… just because she's… _gone_ ," his eyes were definitely beginning to water again, "doesn't mean that we can just call it quits. If anything, we should be more determined to find Afton. It was his stupid robot that killed Riley, our _friend_ , who we literally embarked on this journey to help!" And then Foxy stopped talking, realizing just how loud he had gotten.

"We aren't obligated to do _anything_ if she's not here anymore. I mean, let's face it. This is fucking crazy. She was fucking crazy."

Foxy turned around. "She was _not_ crazy!" Sure, Riley was his boss. But she was also his friend. And she was pretty much always there to help or defend him when he couldn't defend himself, so he was going to do the same for her.

"How do you know that? She kept a bunch of stuff from us, didn't she?"

"Okay, first off—"

"I mean, you heard all that weird shit she started saying, didn't you? That certainly wasn't normal. A surefire sign of not being all there, if you ask me."

"Shut up!" Foxy shouted, his voice cracking. "Why do you always have to start stuff for no reason? You're _wrong_. End of story. If you want to stay home, go right ahead. But I'm gonna keep looking for Afton. This isn't the time to give up." He crossed his arms and stared at his lap.

An uncomfortable silence filled the car once more.

"Foxy is... right, I think," Charlie murmured. "We still have unfinished business. We can't turn back yet. Not when he's still out there, hurting people."

"I agree." 

"Y-yeah, m-me too."

"Ugh, whatever."

"Okay then, we're gonna keep going," Foxy muttered, more to himself than anyone else.

He finally started up the car, giving the warehouse one last look before he drove away.


	15. Mask

Foxy's hometown got a lot of rain after the warehouse burned down. Heavy rain that poured down nonstop. It left a depressing feeling in the air.

How fitting was that?

He watched the rainfall from his seat at one of the tables in the dining area. The large windows that stretched across the front wall of the building offered a great view of it.

It had been a week and a half since the fire. Nothing particularly interesting had happened in that period of time. Trying to track Afton down was proving to be harder the second time around.

"Have you looked through these reports yet?" Michael asked, turning his laptop around.

Charlie leaned forward, squinting at the screen. "Yeah, three times."

"Oh, nevermind then. I'm going to try some different keywords." Michael typed something, then sat back as he waited for everything to load.

"Alright."

Ballora sighed, "Foxy, could you please stop clicking that pen so aggressively? It's driving me mad."

Foxy looked away from the window, placing the pen that he had been holding down. "Yeah, sorry." 

Riley had been the owner-manager of the business, but because she had not been the _only_ owner, Foxy, Ballora, and Freddy were not all out of the job. They worked things out with the other owner and Ballora, who had been the assistant manager, became manager.

"Maybe you should take a break,” Ballora suggested. “You've been unfocused for the past hour."

All of the funeral stuff was still being discussed. 

"Okay," Foxy mumbled without objection. He stood up and slowly started heading for the back rooms.

"C-could y-you grab me some chips on y-your way back?!" Freddy shouted after him.

"Don't forget to say please."

"Please?!"

"Sure!" Foxy shouted back.

He decided to take the long way to their small personal kitchen rather than the one they used to make pizza for customers, which they had been in a lot as of late. Ballora figured that having zero income was _probably_ not a good thing, so they had started accepting takeout orders again while they searched.

Their most recent search session had just reached the six-hour mark. A new record, Foxy was sure.

Afton was slippery. And it really didn't help that, for the most part, he managed to go under the radar. 

Maybe it'd be easier if—

_CLACK!_

Foxy looked down, realizing that he had accidentally kicked something.

A clown mask.

Of course.

He was unsure of how Riley's mask had ended up on the floor, but they _had_ left the place in a bit of mess before they headed off to Charlie's work and still had yet to clean most of it up. 

Foxy bent down and picked it up. Something about leaving it to gather dust on the floor felt wrong and disrespectful.

He decided to stop by Baby's old office before he went to the kitchen. 

He pushed the door open slowly, as if he might've been interrupting something going on inside. 

But no, the room was dark. And empty.

He flicked on the light, stepping further in.

Foxy typically didn't enter Baby's office if she wasn't in it. Nobody did. She had been a private person, after all. 

In retrospect, it was probably because she didn't want anyone to find out anything about her past, which she used to try so hard to keep under wraps.

Maybe it didn't matter much anymore, but he still felt weird standing in the empty office.

Foxy shook his head and made his way even further into the space.

There was a thumbtack sticking out of the wall behind her desk that Baby used to hang her mask off of. He figured that was the best place to stick it.

It was rather high up on the wall. Foxy had a difficult time reaching it, even with the thick heels on his boots. He ended up reaching back up a second time to straighten it out before he was satisfied.

"There we go," he said to himself.

After staring at it for a few seconds, he turned to leave. He felt as if he couldn't stand there any longer without his vision starting to blur.

Once the door was closed again, Foxy started heading for the kitchen.

Bon-Bon was in there, sitting atop the kitchen table next to a bowl of popcorn while he watched whatever was playing on the small TV. 

Or maybe he wasn't watching it? Foxy was still unsure if the puppet had a mind of his own or not. After everything he had seen recently, he would not be too surprised if Bon-Bon did.

Whatever the case, Bon-Bon said nothing and neither did Foxy, which he was perfectly fine with.

Foxy grabbed the chips off the top of the fridge and left rather quickly, tossing them to Freddy when he reentered the dining area.

"Yay! Th-thank you!"

"Did I miss anything important?"

"Might've," Michael said. "I think we're actually on to something."

Whatever tiredness that had been hanging over Foxy seemed to disappear all of a sudden. "Really?!" He dashed over to where Michael sat, leaning over him and practically onto him.

"Yeah, take a look at this. Some creeper in a rabbit costume tried to lure a couple of kids into his car this morning. Luckily, some passerby spotted him and reported it. He wasn't caught, but he was spotted in the general area again a few hours later." Michael pointed to a news article he had pulled up. 

Well, more specifically, he pointed to a location that was written in the article.

"Rabbit costume?" Ballora repeated.

"Yeah, you see, back when Dad first ran a restaurant with Charlie's dad, they used to have these special mascot costumes called springlock suits. They were special because they also doubled as fully functional animatronics. There were only two. A golden rabbit and a golden bear. Dad wore the rabbit costume during his first murder spree back in the eighties," Michael explained.

"But how is that possible? How do you turn an animatronic into a wearable suit?"

Charlie spoke up before Michael could. "With springlocks. Basically, they snap open and hug the inside of the costume when employees need to wear it. They snap closed to form the endoskeleton of the animatronic when they need it to perform. Neither suits were used for very long, though. Mostly because the springlocks had a tendency to… uh, close while employees were still inside the suit."

Ballora cringed, presumably at the mental image of someone being crushed by a springlock costume. "Oh my, that is gruesome."

"It is," Michael agreed.

"So… are we gonna go search that area/around that area now?" Foxy was anxious to get a move on again.

"It's our only lead right now, so we might as well." Ballora shrugged. "Could you please lock up for us, Michael?"

"I can," he replied, handing one of the maps on the table to Foxy. "Take this with you before you leave. Don't wanna get lost."

"Thanks."

It was time to head out again.


	16. The Cold Eyes of the Killer

The rain hadn't let up even slightly by the time everybody had piled into the car once more. It pounded viciously against the windshield. And that, in combination with the lack of streetlights, was making it hard for Foxy to see where he was driving.

"Are we almost there?"

Charlie picked up the map again. "Yeah. Take a left and there should be a laundromat we can park behind."

"Gotcha." Foxy turned and pulled into a nearly empty parking lot. He pulled the hood of his jacket over his head before he hopped out of the car.

Charlie opened the trunk. Their supplies hadn't left it since their last endeavor. "Where do you think we should look first?”

“Uh…” Foxy took a step around the side of the laundromat, looking at the other buildings that surrounded them. Before he could give a proper response, Freddy stepped up beside him and pointed to a rather derelict one.

“Hey Ch-charlie, isn’t that the name of th-the chain that y-y-your dad and Afton owned?”

The faded, grimy, crooked sign was difficult to read through the rain and darkness, but Foxy could manage to make out _‘Freddy Fazbear’s Pizza’._

“It is,” Charlie confirmed. “That must be why he’s been around here. If he’s still in this area, then he’s gotta be in there.”

The group made their way over to the abandoned building. 

The front door was locked. The backdoor was locked. The large windows were boarded up.

Double-checking to make sure that there was still no one around, Charlie grabbed a board that was hanging loose on one side and pried it off the rest of the way. Freddy helped her pull another one off, exposing more of the broken window behind it.

“I think I slip through there and unlock the door,” Charlie said.

“Can you?” asked Foxy, who was still repeatedly checking to see if anybody was seeing them do this. “What about the glass?”

Charlie took the butt end of her metal flashlight and used it to knock the large shards of glass in the frame out, then pulled her cargo jacket off and used it to cover the tiny bits left behind so they did not cut her.

“Oh. I see.”

Awkwardly, she squeezed through the small opening and got inside, grabbing her jacket back. She could vaguely be seen behind the grimy door as she went to unlock it. “Come on in.”

Upon setting foot onto the dirty checkered floors, Foxy was immediately hit with the strong scent of decay. It was much like the smell in the warehouse, only worse. He fought the urge to gag.

Beside him, Ballora coughed into her elbow. "Goodness me, this place reeks."

"It really does. Don't stand too close to me because I might puke," Foxy warned before making his way further in.

Things were creaking. Rain was leaking in from outside.

Everything was in disarray.

Big tables were spread across the space. Some overturned, some still with raggedy table cloths and cheap foil party hats on their surfaces. Ripped and peeling red vinyl chairs were placed haphazardly around them.

Mysterious dark stains streaked down the walls, which were covered in old children’s crayon drawings on yellowing paper.

A few arcade cabinets were crowded around an entrance into a different party area, one of which was knocked onto its side with the screen shattered.

Then there were two stages. One smaller with half-drawn purple curtains and another larger one completely concealed behind black curtains.

Foxy peeked behind the black curtains. There was nothing there. When he turned away, he noticed a door across from where he stood that was labeled _‘Backstage’._

He attempted to open it, but it wouldn't budge.

"Crap," he muttered.

"M-m-maybe try kicking it open," Freddy suggested.

Foxy doubted that would end well.

He tried it anyway.

As expected, the desired effect did not occur. The rotted wood gave in and Foxy ended up kicking a hole right through the door, getting his foot stuck in the process.

"Crap," he repeated, grabbing onto Freddy's shoulder so that he didn't fall over.

Freddy helped him pull his foot out.

"Well, I'm not trying that ever again."

Foxy reached through the hole he had created, undid the lock on the other side, and opened the door.

They were greeted with shelves that held empty animatronic heads and a big metal table with a rusted endoskeleton laying on it.

"Not a lot in here." Foxy checked underneath the table.

Nothing.

Charlie and Ballora entered the room right after he stood back up.

"Anything?"

"Nope." He was about to leave when Charlie stopped him.

"Hold on, I found something."

"What? What did you find?"

She knelt next to a small stretch of wall that was untouched by shelves. "Look. There's an outline here. This is a panel." She brought her index finger across a rectangular shape on the wall, tracing it.

"Oh my Scott, you're right!" Foxy whisper-yelled. "Freddy, get out the screwdriver!”

Freddy obliged, pulling the tool out of his backpack.

Charlie took it and wedged it in the small space between the panel and the wall, jiggling it until the panel popped off.

The rectangle-shaped hole led to a surprisingly large room that had apparently been walled off. It was _full_ of animatronics. They were slumped against the walls, half-assembled, propped up with stands...

"He could be hiding behind any of those suits right now," Foxy said, mostly to himself. He could see multiple yellow ones. "If he's in here at all, that is."

They all crawled through the hole and stood up, very slowly drifting away from one another as they shined their flashlights around the space, investigating every dark shape that they saw.

It was really quiet.

Too quiet.

But only for a moment.

A low, raspy laugh reverberated off of the walls.

Ballora let out a shriek.

Foxy, Freddy, and Charlie immediately turned towards where they last saw her.

Afton was there.

Afton was right there.

He was still clad in that rabbit suit, which was was blood-stained, dirt-stained, torn up, and caked with mold that left it a nasty shade of green instead of gold. How Afton thought he'd successfully lure a child in _that_ disgusting thing was far beyond Foxy's guess.

He had one arm wrapped around Ballora, pinning her against him. He used the other to point a rather large knife at her throat.

"I _knew_ you all would show up. You don't give up, do you?"

Nobody stepped closer. They feared that Afton would slit Ballora’s throat if they did.

Unsure of what to do, Foxy tried to keep him talking. "Neither do you. Why are trying to start your side career up again? What do you want?"

"I just wanted my kids back—"

"Well, you can't have them back," Charlie interrupted. "Another… another one of them just died, and you can't do to her what you did to Miles… there probably isn't enough left to do that..."

"And th-the other one doesn't w-want anything to do with y-you!"

Afton let out a bark-like laugh. "You didn't let me finish. I _wanted_ my kids back. Now I just want to get you nuisances out of my way." He brought the knife closer to Ballora's throat.

"Don't!" was all Foxy could think to say, nearly taking half a step closer.

"Or what? Do you plan on stopping me? I can assure you that no matter what you try, you won't be able to stop me. She's all mine." He leaned in closer to Ballora's ear. "Isn't that right? You're all mine..."

A myriad of emotions crossed over her face -- far too fast for Foxy to keep up with -- before settling on disgust. “Crève la gueule ouverte!” she hissed.

Ballora brought her feet up and kicked against a tattered animatronic that stood near the wall.

Afton lost his balance.

His back hit the damp wall behind him.

His grip loosened.

Ballora took the opportunity to break free, wrenching the large blade from his grasp. She whipped around and stumbled away, leaving Foxy to catch her by her shoulders.

"Try to come near us and I will use this on _you_.” She pointed the weapon at Afton, her voice shaking ever so slightly.

Foxy attempted to wipe the look of shock and lingering fear off of his face.

Afton laughed again, still leaning against the wall. His eyes appeared to float within the black void of his costume's eyeholes. It made the way he stared at them all the more unsettling. "It'll take more than that, I can assure you. You can't get rid of me. I'll _always_ come back. If you even _dare_ to try, I—"

_SNAP!_

His eyes went wide.

There was another loud snap.

Then another.

And another.

And another.

Even if they had anticipated it, nobody would have been able to act in time and prevent what happened next.

Afton let out a blood-curdling scream. His entire body seized up and he collapsed to the floor, then he started to writhe about. Copious amounts of blood started to ooze from the tears and gaps in the costume, pooling around him at a startlingly fast pace.

After what felt like forever, he stilled. 

"What… just happened?" Foxy asked blankly, unable to look away.

"I... think the springlocks just went off..." Charlie said. "The moisture on the wall must've loosened them."

"Is he d-dead?"

"I don't see how he could be alive. He's dead. He has to be."

William Afton was dead.


	17. The Aftermath

It was all over.

William Afton was dead. He was _actually_ dead.

It didn't seem like the day would ever actually come, but it did.

Foxy couldn't get the sound of Afton’s rattling scream out of his head no matter how hard he tried. Or the visual of his cold, bloodshot, lifeless eyes peering at him through the costume's eyeholes. The eyes bored holes straight into him, even as the four of them crawled out of the room.

But he would forget their stare eventually.

...Or at least, he hoped he would.

They returned home.

Charlie and Michael said their goodbyes to them, finally fully returning to their lives. Foxy was admittedly very sad to see them go after spending so much time in their presence.

Ballora called Chief Burke and tipped him off about where Afton's body was. There was _no_ way that any of them were going to touch him.

Freddy took all of the supplies out of the trunk of the car. They wouldn't be needing that stuff at hand anymore.

Foxy spent most of the day cleaning the front of their home and work. They were finally going to reopen the day after, which he was thankful for.

He was... exhausted.

Maybe he would finally sleep soundly again with the whole ordeal over.


	18. Come One, Come All

_"Hey."_

_Scott, everything hurt._

_"Hey fella, you okay?"_

_Foxy didn't think it was possible for his head to be pounding harder than it was._

_"You're not dead, are you?"_

_His eyes refused to open._

_"Well, it looks like you're still breathing, so… probably not."_

_Who was talking? He didn't recognize the voice._

_"You must've been hit pretty hard, eh?"_

_Come on, opening his eyes shouldn't have been this difficult._

_Slowly but surely, light flooded into his vision. He squinted._

_"Oh, would you look at that. Finally awake. How do you feel, pal?_

_Somebody was standing over him, the sun up above only partially hidden behind them. It made their features pretty much impossible to make out._

_Foxy stared at the dark figure for a long while before the question finally processed in his head. The only response he could muster was, "What?"_

_The person above him shifted a little so that they blocked the sun completely, their features finally becoming visible. "You got knocked out." It was a young woman. She looked rather bored._

_"How?"_

_"Uh..." she looked up at whatever was going on past where he laid, brushing her hair out of her face, "some guy tried to steal your wallet. He had brown hair and a purple hat. That ringing a bell?"_

_“Yeah… Wait, does that mean my wallet is gone now?”_

_"Nah, I've got it." She pulled a pink wallet out from one of her coat pockets. "He dropped it when I started chasing him. You need help up?"_

_"I think so."_

_Foxy accepted her outstretched hand and she pulled him to his feet with relative ease._

_He immediately felt dizzy and unable to balance properly. He ended up awkwardly holding onto her for support._

_"You alright?"_

_"I… think so," he said again._

_"Good. Here's your wallet back."_

_"Thanks, uh..." he trailed off, still unsure of the person's identity._

_"Riley."_

_"Riley. Thanks."_

_"No problem..."_

_"Alex."_

_"Alex. Well, Alex, you should probably go to a hospital because you might have a concussion."_

_Foxy looked at his surroundings, feeling as if he had forgotten where he was before. Apparently, he was n the space between a metal fence and the back of a circus tent. "I, uh… where would that be exactly?"_

_Riley rolled her eyes, though she didn't actually appear to be all that annoyed. "Follow me. It's not that far from here."_

_She started to walk in between a couple of tents to get back into the crowd of people that were leaving. Foxy had to walk pretty fast to keep up with her._

_They reached what was probably the most concentrated area of people when he started to lose her._

_Foxy called her name to try and get her to stop, but she didn't. She probably couldn't hear him._

_"Riley—!"_

_He bumped straight into some guy. Foxy mumbled a quick apology and tried to walk past the man, but he couldn't. The man mimicked his movement and blocked his way._

_Foxy looked up at the guy's face, about to ask him what he was trying to do. He didn't end up doing that, though. He found his breath caught in his throat._

_The man was gaunt-faced with stringy brown hair and deep-set gray eyes._

_"You. What're you — how???"_

_Afton placed his hands on Foxy's shoulders, his grip becoming painfully tight very quickly._

_He leaned in really close, close enough for Alex to feel his hot breath against his face. "I always come back." Throwing his head back, he started laughing, laughing far louder than what was humanly possible._

_All of the people around them abruptly vanished, and in that same instant, everything burst into flames._

_Foxy started to struggle as hard as he could, but he couldn't seem to break out of Afton's iron grip._

_Looking past him, Foxy could still see Riley, who was apparently completely oblivious to her surroundings._

_He yelled her name again. Practically screamed it, actually._

_Without warning, a huge, broad-shouldered, silver-maned creature pulled itself out of the Earth._

_It grabbed Riley and disappeared into the flames._

_"Riley, no!"_

_Foxy still couldn't break free. He was trying as hard as he could, and he still couldn't break free._

_He squeezed his eyes shut._

_A hand left his shoulder._

_"Alex..."_

_The grip of the remaining hand grew very, very loose._

_"Fox..."_

_He opened his eyes again, finding that the hand on his shoulder was ridden with various bite marks and seemed to be bent at a rather painful angle. The wrist must have been broken._

_His eyes trailed up the rest of the bloody, slightly burnt arm._

_"...Riley?"_

_Rather large gashes ran diagonally across her face, going through her lips and over the bridge of her nose. Soot, blood, and hydraulic fluid decorated her clothes, which were torn up. "They're laughing at me," she said._

_"What?"_

_"They're laughing at me," she repeated. "They think it's funny, what they've done. They think it's clever."_

_"I don't… I don't understand."_

_"They think death is no big deal. It doesn't matter to them." She unintentionally leaned forward a bit. Blood dripped from her face and onto his. "They… he only becomes stronger after it."_

_"What are you talking about?"_

_**RIINNGG!**_

_"What—?"_

_**RIINNGG!**_

_What was with that ringing?_

_Why did it sound like it was coming from everywhere?_

_Wait..._

Foxy opened his eyes partially, being greeted with the darkness of his bedroom and the coldness of the floor.

His alarm was going off.

He untangled himself from his sheets and got up to turn it off.

Once the room was silent again, he sat back down on the floor, trying to forget what he had just witnessed in his dream.

It wasn't abnormal for Foxy's dreams to basically just be memories of his. Though, the differences between the actual memory and the dream were typically more subtle and didn't leave him feeling upset afterward.

He would've definitely preferred if the dream had ended more like how the actual memory did since it didn’t involve his friend dying.

...Foxy and the others hadn't really talked about her since they told Michael what happened. And briefly discussed the funeral stuff.

It didn't seem like anybody wanted to. The closest they had gotten was nearly letting her name slip out. It was usually during the moments when they almost forgot she was gone.

Foxy wasn't really sure if it was better or worse that way. On one hand, he knew they would have to talk about her at some point. But on the other hand, he really didn't care. He didn’t want to. He felt like if he did, it would really start to sink in.

And he didn't want that to happen.

Foxy was almost sort of expecting Riley to walk straight out of that burning building and say, "Did you really think you can get rid of me that easily?"

Sadly, that didn't happen.

But that was enough dwelling.

Foxy didn't really want to get up, but he had to prepare himself for work.

It had been a while, hadn't it?


	19. At the Door

Foxy's first proper shift back was _not_ as fun as he expected it to be. He actually quite liked his job (even if the kids were a little bit wild sometimes) but the place didn't feel as lively as it usually did.

Perhaps that was just because they had been closed for so long that nobody expected them to properly open their doors again. Yes, that had to be it.

"Hey, do y-you know where the m-mop bucket is?"

"Uh... I think I left it by the bathrooms."

"Th-thanks!"

Despite not having many customers, the building looked as if they had. The few people that had come in left _quite_ the mess. Pizza on the walls, pizza on the floor, pizza on the fucking ceiling.

Foxy had zero clue how the hell it got up there, having only learned of its existence once it fell onto his head. He ended spending fifteen minutes trying to get cheese and sauce out of his hair. That was fun.

"Foxy, could you please sweep the confetti off of the stage?"

"Sure thing!"

They actually ended up closing later than usual because the last party wouldn't leave. Normally, they'd be all cleaned up just before the sun set completely. But this time around, it was already pitch black outside and they were still cleaning.

Hopefully, they wouldn't be for much longer.

Maybe Foxy could be done by the time he finished sweeping up the confetti.

He _really_ wanted to be done.

He looked around as he swept. The others weren't in the room anymore, so it was dead quiet.

It almost felt strange. The three of them had hardly been apart in weeks, and Foxy had grown somewhat used to constant noise. Mostly thanks to Freddy, who practically shouted everything he said.

Foxy was unsure whether or not he enjoyed the silence or hated it. It left him alone with his thoughts.

Though, not for very long.

There was a sharp knock on the glass door.

He quickly tore his eyes away from the stage he was sweeping, finding the dark shape of a person standing outside. He was positive he had changed the sign on the door so that people knew they were closed. And even then, who would want to come to what was essentially a kid's place so late?

Well, maybe that was a stupid question. From his recent experiences, Foxy had gathered that there were people who would definitely come when it was pitch black outside. Some friendly and some not so much.

"Foxy, could you please see who that is outside?" Ballora asked from somewhere in the back hallway.

He flinched slightly at the sound of her voice, having not expected to hear it.

He spared a glance in her general direction before quickly looking back at that person outside the door.

Foxy couldn't tell if they were looking at him or not. It was far too dark.

"Uh, sure." 

He took his broom with him as he approached the door just in case the person was someone not particularly friendly. Afton may have been gone, but Foxy still felt the need to be more cautious. Not that a broom was the best of weapons.

He could begin to make out more of the person as he got closer.

They were wearing a torn-up jacket with the hood pulled over their head... and jeans, ones equally as torn-up with various stains. Dirt and grass, probably.

The face...

Well, Foxy would have to wait until he was right next to the door to see it. The hood and poor lighting helped keep it hidden.

Scott, was the walk from the stage to the door always stupidly long? Or was he just imagining that?

Finally, he reached the door.

He gripped the broom handle ridiculously tight and stared right up at the person's face.

They were very, _very_ pale, and their skin was smudged with dry blood and soot.

" _Riley?_ " he asked blankly, though she probably couldn't hear his quiet tone through the glass.

"I don't have my keys anymore," she said, her voice slightly muffled.

Without looking away for fear of her disappearing, Foxy undid the deadbolt on the door. 

"Thank you." She stepped inside and pulled her hood off.

Foxy was still unsure if he was hallucinating or not.

"Are you even real? I feel like you're not real." He poked her face.

Riley pushed his hand away with a slight smile. "Yeah, I'm pretty sure I'm real. And I'd appreciate it if you didn't poke my face for uncomfortably long periods of time."

"You're _alive_."

"Yes."

"You're alive," Foxy repeated.

"Yes."

"Holy crap. But I thought... We all saw— I don't—" He suddenly seemed unable to form the correct words. "I saw the stairwell collapse with you in it! We waited outside of the remains of the warehouse for a while and you never came out... We all thought you were dead."

"Things aren't always as they appear to be." She shrugged. "And besides, did you all really think you could get rid of me that easily? Nice try."

Foxy stared at her for a moment before hugging her, not caring if he got blood, dirt, or soot, or whatever else on himself. He didn't care that he was crying. "I missed you."

It took her a minute to hug back, likely due to surprise.

"Missed ya too, Fox."

The hug lasted way longer than it should have, but Foxy didn't care. 

"Oh wait, I should tell the others that you're back!" He stepped back a bit. 

"Yeah, probably."

"We gotta catch you up on what you missed. You missed a lot." Foxy wiped the wetness of his eyes onto the back of his gloves before he grabbed the redhead's heavily bandaged hand.

He shouted Freddy and Ballora's names as he started dragging her away.

Riley was alive. She was _alive_ somehow.


	20. Behind the Rubble

It was needless to say that Freddy and Ballora were a little shocked when Foxy dragged Riley into the room.

As Foxy said they would, they all caught Baby up on what she missed while she was gone: Their decision to continue the mission in her absence, Ballora taking over as the boss, them tracking Afton to Fazbear's, him dying in the springlock suit...

It came as no surprise to anybody that Riley had practically no reaction to the news of her father's death.

"We told Burke where his body was, so he took care of that. We didn't want to touch it."

"Everything is all c-cleaned up now too. You'd n-never even know wh-what we did!"

"And of course, with your return, I'll step down as boss."

Something told Foxy that Ballora wasn't too sad about that.

"And th-that's everything!" Freddy finished. "At least, I think th-that's everything."

Not quite.

There was a question burning in the back of Foxy's mind. An important one.

"Well, I think there's still something we should probably talk about," he said. "I... Riley, if you don't mind me asking... what... you kknow, happened down there in the warehouse? How did you get out?"

She seemed unbothered by the question. "Ah. I knew you were waiting for an opportunity to ask that. I could see you fidgeting about out of the corner of my eye." She cleared her throat. "Right, so, as far as you all knew, the collapsed stairwell killed both The Wolf and I, correct?"

Everyone nodded in confirmation.

"Well, I suppose it's obvious now, but it didn't kill us. The Wolf jolted back the moment debris started falling and it sent us both tumbling down the staircase before we could end up buried. It released its grip on me the moment we hit the bottom of the stairs. I tried getting away, but... it was too fast. It stopped me."

She awkwardly gestured to three large gashes that traveled from her left shoulder and down over her collarbone.

"I can't remember much of what happened after that, honestly. I got knocked out at some point and woke up to find myself being dragged further into the warehouse. I managed to worm my way free of the grip it had on my ankle and bolted. It chased me, of course. But I managed to lose it in the maze of hallways."

"And you found another exit down there?" Foxy asked.

"Oh, no. No, no. I tried, but I couldn't find one. I ended up finding my way back to the staircase, though. It was still blocked. It occurred to me that it was probably my best option, so... I decided to claw my way out." Riley lifted her hands up, revealing her bloodied fingernails and the numerous scuffs and cuts on her skin. "I knew I was stuck below three floors of collapsed building. And I knew it wouldn't be fun. But it was better than sitting around and waiting to die."

"Jeez, we should've stayed outside longer."

"We were out there for three hours, Foxy," Ballora pointed out quietly.

"Yeah, I don't blame you guys for leaving. Took me days to make my way out. Couldn't really tell you exactly how many, though. It was _dark_ down there."

"What did you do after you got out?"

"Walk. What else could I do? I had no way of contacting any of you. Couldn't get a signal on my phone. And as you already know, the warehouse was surrounded by a lot of forest. There was no one around to ask for help."

"What about after you made your way back to town? Couldn't you get a signal then? Didn't you ask anyone for help? Or a ride?"

"No. Phone had died. Didn't want to have to explain to anybody what happened to me." Riley began to walk away before anybody could say anything else. "Anyway, I gonna go take a shower because I feel abso-fucking-lutley disgusting."

"Shouldn't you uh, get those wounds checked out by a doctor or something?" Foxy called after her.

"I'll deal with it myself," she responded before disappearing around the corner.

Foxy looked to Ballora, "Does she... know how to properly handle that stuff herself?"

The dancer shrugged. "I don't know. You know how she is about hospitals, though. Remember when she sliced her hand open in the kitchen and needed stitches? She took care of that herself because she refused to go."

With the knowledge of Riley's past that Foxy now had, he could understand her aversion. But if he saw her injuries getting worse, he was going to find a way to convince her to go. "Alright... I still can't believe she made it out of that alive."

"Me neither. But I'm glad that she's still here with us."

"Yeah, me too."

"Me th-three!"

"Maybe this place will _actually_ feel normal again now. Well, as normal as it gets when you work here."


	21. Left Dissatisfied

"BB, please put that down! You're gonna break something!"

_CRASH!_

"Oh Scott, what have you done?!"

Charlie sighed, stepping into the kitchen to avoid the chaos that was unfolding in the party rooms. The doors swung closed just as something caught fire.

Or at least, that's what she could gather from Teddy's distressed yelling, which was followed by something that sounded suspiciously like a fire extinguisher. 

"Did you go on some life-altering journey or something after you ran off? What's with the new look?"

Charlie turned to look at her blonde coworker, who was leaning against one of the counters. "I've been back for a while now, Chris. Are you just now noticing I got a haircut?"

"I mean... yeah. I've only ever seen you come out of your room for your shifts, and you're always covered head to toe during those 'cause of your costume," she said. "Why'd ya cut it?"

Charlie shrugged. "Just sick of it being in the way, I guess." Shorter hair was more convenient. Especially with all of the running, bloodthirsty machines, murderers, and other ridiculous stuff that seemed to be prevalent in her life. 

Well, it wasn't really prevalent anymore. Not with everything finally over.

But who knew? Maybe something else would come along.

Or maybe the same thing would come back again like it always seemed to.

...Or maybe nothing would happen at all.

"Did you like, get in a fight with someone, and found yourself momentarily blinded by your long hair and left open to attack?"

Charlie frowned. "What do you think I do when I'm not here?"

Chris shrugged. "I dunno. You're always being all aloof and mysterious and disappearing off with weird groups of people, like, uh… that clown and her friends! I mean, they were nice and stuff. But they were also really aloof. What did you even get up to with them?"

"I don't think you would believe me if I told you."

"See? You're doing it now. I'm just gonna assume that whatever you did involved lawbreaking."

Charlie didn’t say anything, just looked away from Chris and awkwardly grabbed a water bottle from the fridge. 

Apparently, that was enough of an answer for Chris. Her eyes went wide. “Wait, I was joking. Did you _actually_ do something illegal with those people?!”

"I... We didn’t—” Charlie struggled to find words. “Don't worry about it. It's over now."

Instead of finding that answer suspicious, Chris only seemed disappointed that she didn’t get any details. “Okay, whatever. But if it's all over why do you still seem so like, on edge?”

"I… don't know. This thing… it’s something that I thought was over _years_ ago, but it somehow came back again. What if it does for a third time? I think I’m just being paranoid, but…” Charlie trailed off and put her water down. “I need to go outside and get some air.”

Teddy hadn't been too happy that Charlie ran off with Riley, Foxy, Ballora, Bon-Bon, and Freddy, but the pizzeria ended up closing for a short while after the attempted kidnapping so she had managed to keep her job. Partially because of the attempting kidnapping, and partially because it turned out that they hadn't been up to health code.

Teddy probably wouldn't be as lenient if Charlie left a second time, though. Even if it wasn’t for as long. 

“Uh… should I tell Teddy?” Chris asked. 

“I don’t know. Do whatever.”


End file.
